Commissioner's Safety Fund - 2023-2024

This grants scheme channelled funding into community projects that help reduce the risk of crime and abuse and increase public safety.

There was £400,000 available for the 2023/2024 financial year and you could apply for up to £10,000 or £20,000 of funding for a twelve month project (depending on the round).  This maximum exists to support as many projects and initiatives as possible.

The Commissioner was keen to hear from organisations that can make a meaningful difference in the lives of those residing in Leicestershire, Leicester and Rutland.

There were three funding rounds for the 2023/2024 year, alternating between general and specialist rounds. 

Funding Round Details:
RoundOpening DateClosing Date
 1.      General (now closed) 3rd July 2023 31st July 2023 (5pm)
 2.      General (now closed)
 4th September 2023  2nd October 2023 (5pm)
 3.      Keeping Your Communities Safe (now closed)
11th December 2023 15th January 2024 (5pm)

 


Funding awarded for 2023/2024:

Round 1 - General
 
ORGANISATION
 
NAME OF PROJECT

PROJECT BRIEF
GEOGRAPHICAL
AREA
 AMOUNT
OF FUNDING
St Matthews Big Local St Matthews supporting a safer City through sports engagement Year 2 To provide open access for  young people across the city with an additional 4 hours of daily organised and structured sports activities in the daytime during School half term/s and school summer holidays and floodlit football on Friday nights (9pm to 11pm) for 20 weeks during the winter months.  City  £9,973.70
Home Farm Centre Restorative Justice in the community The project is to raise awareness of Restorative Justice (RJ)  by organising community RJ briefing workshops and training to local stakeholders in LLR and community and faith leaders (Police/ Housing staff / CrASBU/ etc). Training will provide the skills and tools necessary to create peaceful solutions and restore community relationships and cohesion and will be available to all community members.The project also raises RJ awareness and education with beat/neighbourhood officers at police stations in LLR and will implement processes that supports and empowers people to resolve, manage and transform conflict/disputes within their neighbourhoods. The project awareness will be launched on Monday 20th November 2023 during International Restorative Week in Leicester.  City  £9,995.00
The BACA Charity The BACA volunteer project The project is for volunteers to deliver support including 1:1 reading lessons, CV writing, and mentoring sessions. These are delivered to young people who have arrived in the UK alone. The project involves 30 volunteers and supports 35 young people per year. Charnwood  £10,000.00
Barlaston Parish Council  Barlaston MVAS To obtain x2 permanent VAS sigs to record and monitor speeding in an identified area of Newbold Road. To monitor and identify the worst period and places along the road and to use this information to identify the best places for a Community Speedwatch.  Hinckley and Bosworth, Barlaston  £6,302.00
Platform 31 At The Kitchen Table (ATKT Leicestershire) To create a space for holistic creative activity to reduce isolation, improve wellbeing and a sense of self. Women’s sessions will be 3 hour sessions led by creative practitioners, supported by facilitators and run at the kitchen table in the communal space within refuges. 125 art packs will be distributed across Women’s Ad refuges in Leicester and Leicestershire. City & County £9,941.25
Guru Nanak Gurdwara Football CIC GNGFC ASB Prevention Through Personal Enrichment To provide 16 two-hour football games/training sessions to children and young people every Saturday, 9AM to 11AM, as well as four one-hour workshops and 10 short talks on topics such as antisocial behaviour, knife crime, careers and culture exploration, aimed at opening up future pathways into sports, policing, arts and business. City £10,000.00
ZamZam Unlimited Possibilities CIC The Den The project will provide a safe space for young people to enjoy a range of activities, develop team building and social skills, engage in a wide range of activities and develop new skills, have access to support and food provision and engage in healthy outdoor activities. Examples of activities include football, basketball and/or rounders and periodically Graffiti Art, Woodwork, Health and Wellbeing group, Counselling and Arts. Youth Sessions will be delivered twice a week for two hours and sports activates will be provided weekly. City £10,000.00
Street Doctors Ltd Leicester Street Doctors The project will deliver 20 group workshops for young people aged 11-25 where they will learn:
 The true lifelong medical consequences of violence, including busting myths about ‘safe’ places to be stabbed on the body and the effects of physical trauma such as blood loss.
The most common emotional and mental health reactions to experiencing violence so they are better aware of how they might be impacted.
How to assess and approach the scene of an attack and safely work with emergency services, including the information needed to call an ambulance and how to work with police.
How to provide emergency first aid to someone who has been stabbed or knocked out, to keep them alive until emergency services arrive.
To share their learning with others using a simple, memorable ‘algorithm’ with step-by-step instructions printed on a card.
City £7,500.00
Team Hub on the Streetz Team Hub CIC To partner with New College, Leicestershire Police and community members to identify the routes home from school where violence and ASB has occurred, so that youth workers can make a difference for children and young people aged 11-16.  The two youth workers will be on the route home from 3pm-4pm Monday to Friday for every academic day of the school year from September 2023 – July 2024. The youth workers will act as trusted adults and a point of contact. They will build positive relationships, de-escalate any incidents and sign post young people to support and diversionary activities in the area. City £10,000.00
Youth Education Project YEP Youth (YYW) The project is to develop a Youth Wing within the YEP, to deliver training sessions to develop key entrepreneur skills at a minimum of once a week, for up to 7 young people aged 16-25 who are currently unemployed. The young people will develop a youth council to assist their learning into making them “job ready”. City £10,000.00
Leicester City in the Community Kicks+ Roadshow The Kicks+ Roadshow will provide targeted 5-week interventions at sites across Leicester and Leicestershire focussed on free, open access football sessions for young people. Locations identified by neighbourhood Police will be delivered in 8 different blocks of 5 weeks. The aim is to deliver sessions across 8 locations: Blaby, Loughborough, Hinckley & Bosworth, Whitwick, Westcotes, Fosse, Beaumont Leys and Eyres Monsell. Sessions will be 90 minutes in duration and would take place in the hours after school, midweek evenings, or holiday periods where young people are often most in need of positive and often diversionary activities. City and County £10,000.00
Bright Path Futures Resources and Supporting Materials Evaluation Providing essential support and resources to empower newly arrived refugees and asylum seekers in the local area, allowing them to make community connections and support cultural integration. This includes both under 18s and adults arriving from countries like Iran, Afghanistan, Kurdistan, Eritrea, Ukraine and others. City and County £10,000.00
St Matthews Community Solution Centre Ltd (trading as EAVA FM) We Will Rise Strive and Succeed The project will include 30 two-hour weekly sessions for 15-20 young people, delivered by a team of qualified youth workers. These sessions will offer opportunities for recipients to learn song-writing, performance, production and recording techniques within the genre of Urban Arts, a genre and style known and valued. Relevant skills in graphic design, video, webwork and promotional activity. Alongside delivery of these specific techniques, skills and sessions will offer basic life and social skills to help young people face everyday issues impacting on them, their friends, families and communities. City £9,910.00
Countryside Watch (East Leicestershire SelectaDNA Property Marking Scheme

To encourage the community to take personal responsibility to protect their properties, vehicles and equipment with the use of forensic property marking products.

The project consists of the distribution of property marking kits to farms, farm workers, businesses and residents with clear instructions and support to mark and protect their property as well as erecting public signage on all approach roads into the identified area to make people aware they are entering a Countryside Watch area, the residends are alert and will report crime and suspicious activity and properties and equipment are marked by SelectDNA.

Melton, Harborough, Rutland £5,779.00


Round 2 - General

ORGANISATION

NAME OF PROJECT

PROJECT BRIEF
 GEOGRAPHICAL
AREA
 AMOUNT
OF FUNDING
Big Difference Company Safer Spaces for Event Organisers

To deliver an initiative to tackle violence against women and girls in partnership with Get Off! Live Comedy (GOLC) and A Good Night Out (GNO) Campaign by:

  • Working with venues and promoters in Leicester City Centre to deliver a training workshop focusing on understanding and responding to sexual harassment and assault within licensed premises for 25 comedy promoters, venue staff and members of the festival team. Those who participate in this training will receive a personal workers guide and certificates.
  • Delivering innocent bystander training to provide necessary knowledge and skills to respond to any incidents that they might witness.   
City £4,380.00
Leicester Dialogue Society  Life of a Chickpea To engage with local schools that have a high population of ‘second-generation immigrants’ across the City and County. The project provides a bespoke package of cultural awareness sessions to support children and young people (aged 9-13/year 5-8) with integrating into British culture.  City & County  £10,000.00
Soft Touch Arts The Wall To provide 22 street art and music-based outreach sessions for young people, running between the Easter Holidays in March 2024, and the end of the school summer break in late August 2024.  The aim of the project is to improve skills of young people, such as team working, creative thinking, design and giving and receiving constructive criticism. South Wigston £9,890.41
LMA Youth and Community Development Lives not Knives 2 To deliver boxing and kickboxing sessions to individuals aged 18 plus and those at risk of knife crime, antisocial behaviour, mental health issues, substance use and  addiction,  to channel negative engergy, increase community cohesion and build positive relationships. City £10,000.00
LMA Youth and Community Development Youth Club To deliver youth club sessions, activities, menotrship and motivational talks to young people, to challenge energy in a healthy way, develop self-control and encourage positive relationships with others. City £10,000.00
Young Leicestershire Beaumont Leys Youth Zone To provide partnership led open access youth sessions where youth workers will provide programmes of activities aimed at supporting young people to become active citizens within their community as a deterrent to anti-social behaviour. City £9,940.00
Rowlatts Hill Youth Club Golden Token Golden Token aims to eradicate violence, crime, unemployment, mental health and substance abuse among the youth of Rowlatts Hill. The project aims to combat antisocial behaviour and youth violence by replacing them with golden opportunities, particularly through education and recreational activities.  Sessions will be provided on digital upskilling, employability workshops, creative media exploration and sports activities.  City £9,980.00
Twyford and Thorpe Satchville Parish Council Speed Warning Signs with data collection To purchase three Radar Evolis Vision Radar Speed signs to warn motorists of excessive speed by visibly displaying their actual speed at a given point and collecting data on the number of vehicles that do exceed the speed limit. This will help monitor and identify the need for a Safety Camera Van and Road Policing Unit attendance to clamp down on offenders.  Melton - of Twyford and Thorpe Satchville, Somerby Ward, Melton Mowbray £7,650.00
Women Empoerment Network Helping Others To provide wellbeing courses to asylum seekers to increase their well-being and awareness of British Culture to support them in integrating into the UK Culture. The courses will cover topics such as stress, anxiety, anger management, British values, community cohesion-assimilation of UK cultures, life skills, job readiness, English for work, self-development, EDI, and getting work ready. North West Leicestershire - Kegworth and Appleby Magna £9,974.60
Trade Sexual Health Street Smart Improving LGBT Plus Community Safety

To fund a campaign which will monitor and map homophobic and transphobic incidents across LLR, to signpost to appropriate victim support services, offer the chance to self-refer to the Approach Counselling service run by Trade for emotional support, and encourage them to sign up to Community Safety courses which provide members of the local LGBT+ community skills to enable them to remove themselves safely from potential hate incidents in public spaces. These courses will include sessions on:

  • Keeping safe in public and de-escalating threatening situations.
  • Basic ‘safe escape’ techniques to enable exiting from a threatening situation.
  • Basic first aid techniques.
  • Legal rights and responsibilities, and the importance of reporting hate incidents.  
LLR £9,678.46
Zinthiya Ganeshpanchan Trust Recruitment of Part-Time Multi-Lingual domestic Abuse Support/Outreach Worker

To fund a part time Multilingual Domestic Abuse Support and Outreach Worker who will carry out the following:

  • Outreach activity targeting women who are facing abuse or at the risk of abuse in targeted areas.
  • Provide 1-2-1 emotional support to women who disclose abuse and will encourage them to report the abuse.
  • Provide practical support such as making housing applications to social housing or those fleeing abuse.
  • Supporting women with no recourse to public funding.
City £10,000.00
Rutland First Community Interest Company Uppingham Youth Space

To provide a youth space facility and a range of activities to young people aged 11 to 16 , aimed at bridging the gaps faced by young people and creating a space of equality where every voice is heard.   Activities offered consist of board games, indoor sports, outdoor sports, cooking, embroidery, drawing, dance, acting and glass fusion. 

Rutland £9,974.00
The Saffires Project Street Outreach

To fund a part time Street Outreach Manager to provide coordinated outreach sessions in locations in Leicester where street sex work takes place. Immediate support to women will be provided such as, hot drinks, snacks, directing women to other support agencies, distributing National Ugly Mug alerts about dangerous clients, taking reports on behalf of women when they are victims of crime, as well as supporting them to report crimes to the police.

City £9,744.65
Candy Arts CIC Empowering Youth Through Creative Media

To fund creative media activities for young individuals aged 15-17 in Highfields, Leicester, either involved in or at risk of antisocial behaviour.

City £10,000.00
St Matthew's Big Local That Football Thing After School

The project aims to provide positive, safe, and structured activities, increase trust of young people and provide a platform for building positive relationships. The project offers after school Sports and Personal Development sessions to young people aged 10-21, as well as workshops, which are designed by young people to reflect current topics affecting them. 

City £9,578.00
DORCAS FGM Awareness and Support Leicester

To provide therapeutic services to survivors of FGM as well as an awareness programme to primary and secondary schools, colleges and universities which will focus on preventative methods, offering protection, counselling, and support to identified young girls at risk from FGM.

City and County £10,000.00
Leicester Community Benefit Society Emergency Food and Hygiene Products to Individuals Fleeing Abuse and Those Facing Destitution

To purchase and provide essential food items, school uniforms and sanitary products to those facing a crisis, fleeing abuse, or facing destitution.

City £10,000.00

 

Round 3 - Keeping Your Communities Safe
 
ORGANISATION
 
NAME OF PROJECT

PROJECT BRIEF
GEOGRAPHICAL
AREA
AMOUNT
OF FUNDING
Antoin Akpom Achievements (AAA) Foundation The Metamorphosis Project To provide mentoring support to 15 children who are in their final year at Sacred Heart Academy in Highfields, to successfully transition into secondary school. The aim is to build positive relationships, build emotional intelligence to support with resilience to cope with challenges, and to offer a safe pathway to prevent the entrapment of vulnerable children into anti-social behaviour, gangs and violence.  East Leicester
Spinney Hill
£10,000.00
The Braunstone Foundation (t/a b-inspired) The Grove Community Hub To provide free sporting activities, events and workshops around the dangers of knives for children and young people varying between 8 – 24 years of age. The aim of the project is to reduce antisocial behaviour amongst young people and develop community cohesion and social inclusion of children and young people and the wider community.

West Leicester
Braunstone Park

£19,338.00
Buzzing Roots CIC Do It To provide sport and art activities to young people aged 10 – 24 in Braunstone Park. The aim of the project is to divert and reduce antisocial behaviour and crime rates amongst young people and to improve young people’s understanding of the dangers of youth violence, drugs, gang culture and the impact antisocial behaviour has on individuals and the community. 

West Leicester
Braunstone Park

£9,977.58
Highfields Community Association (t/a Highfields Centre) Young Futures Funding will be used for one-to-one mentoring support as well a responsible leader, two assistant youth workers and an audio-visual artist to deliver 2 weekly diversionary youth development sessions to young people aged 12 – 24. The aim of the project is to reduce community tensions amongst different faith groups, promote community cohesion, prevent and reduce crime amongst young people from Leicester and those residing within the Greater Highfields area, as well as helping raise children and young people’s attainment by re-engaging back into school or further education, as well as wider opportunities such as volunteering and being more economically active.

East Leicester

£19,959.00
Women 4 Change Youth Linked Project To provide young people with sports sessions and wellness workshops which focus on social skills training, healthy eating and mental health. The aim of the project is to decrease crime and violence, increase social skills training including healthy problem solving, emotional regulation skills and increase confidence and self-esteem amongst young people.

East Leicester

£19,848.00
Resilience Through Martial Arts Resilience Program To provide 10 week programmes with the capacity to take up to 10 young people aged 12-17 per intake throughout the year which consists of one to one and group Muay Thai and Kickboxing training and therapeutic support. The project aims to understand the root cause of engagement in serious violence and knife crime and to educate young people who engage in serious violence the skills needed for resilience building, stress, and anger management through a holistic approach and teachable moments.  

St. Matthews, Highfields, Saffron & Eyres Monsell, New Parks, Beaumont Leys, Braunstone and Belgrave

£10,000.00
Somali Community Parents Association Keeping Young People Safe To provide an open access youth club offering a wide range of activities for young people aged 13-18, led by two part-time qualified youth workers. The youth club is predominantly aimed at young men who are at greatest risk of involvement in crime, however the youth club will be open to young women too. The aim of the project is to provide a safe space for young people to go outside the home where they can build their self-confidence, be inspired to think about their future, strengthen their personal and social skills and get access to youth workers who can offer support and identify concerns early.

East Leicester

£9,965.00