Community Action Planning

What is a Community Action Plan? An assessment undertaken by a community to reflect the needs and aspirations of local people – your assessment, your needs, your plan A developing and evolving process resulting in ACTION to benefit the community

Benefits of Community Action Planning Identifies what’s important to the community through a process led and controlled by the community Gets people engaged and involved. Identifies and recruits stakeholders and activists Supports existing / future community groups and projects Evidences what the community needs and where help may be needed from agencies To get people thinking positively – What’s good about living in your community? What do you value? What do you want to protect?

Community Action Planning - How is it done? Set up a steering group List the issues and drivers for the process that you know already Identify key people you think would be able to contribute Agree a process – to involve as many people as possible Get wide input Feed back your findings Prioritise findings if necessary THEN implement the plan – no point doing it otherwise

Community Action Plans - Scope Get people thinking broadly and creatively Use community planning themes to group responses: o Community Wellbeing – includes health and wellbeing, housing, social services, community safety and community facilities o Jobs and the Economy – includes business development, heritage, tourism and rural development o Lifelong Learning – includes education, adult learning, and culture o Sustainable Environment – includes environment, waste management, heritage, waste management, transportation and energy efficiency o Developing our Partnerships – includes working between communities and statutory and other agencies, and working between agencies for communities.

Community Action Plans - Things to remember Individual Community Action Plans reflect differences in community size, issues and aspirations Can be time-consuming but with valuable outcomes Only worth doing if actions are then delivered

Community Action Plans – How MAP can help Time and energy to support and advise the group Some principles and a framework that you can adapt to your needs Experience of working with other communities Access to money for the expenses of the process and publication of the plan Potential access to small grants (<£1K) to help get projects started, and advice on sources of larger grants.