Help!! All tips and advice welcome.

[sfhyouthforum]

Here at the Sydenham and Forest Hill Youth Forum, we are working on setting up a public fund that will help improve the lives of young people as well as the community in the local areas of Sydenham, Forest Hill, and Perry Vale - the three wards our charity covers.

The campaign will ask local people to invest a small amount of money per month that will become a public fund. This means that the money belongs to the public and is therefore accessible to youth orgs/community groups/active residents to spend on things that will improve the lives of people living in the local area. It's up to all of us to make the vital difference. Just £2 per month could build up to thousands of pounds and help close the widening gaps in provision.

So how can we make this work?

Please leave practical and helpful comments, especially anyone with logisitcs, business, charity fundraising, organising skills.

The money will be distributed by the Forum members, which include several youth clubs, voluntary orgs, schools, councillors, faith groups, and residents. Those who wish to submit an application will be able to do so online. Evidence of the successful projects will form part of the evaluation process and will be published online. Provision, provider, and amount given will be published regularly for donors to see where their nuggets have been invested.

For the community to continue to improve, we all need adequate resources, and opportunities to become more actively and directly involved. The more ideas local people create and put into practice, the bigger, and better, and faster, the improvements. The more people give £2 per month, the more provision. The more volunteers to sit on the fundraising committee, the faster the applications are processed. The more the applicants post and publicise their successes, the more people will want to apply for grants and to invest £2 per month in the public fund. The more investment and applications, the bigger the public fund and the stronger the community. The strength is not only about the amount of money given, but about the giving, the ideas, belief, and community involvement to ensure that government cuts do not spell out the end for many small youth and community projects in our local area.

Why invest in a local public fund?

The public fund is fast. If approved, subject to funds, providers get money straightaway. Gaps in provision are dealt with immediately and young people are able to improve their talent while the inspiration and drive is bubbling away.

The public fund is local. This means that the improvements happen in the local area, which means the whole community benefit from the young people's positive actions. Without realising it, just by doing a positive activity, youung people help make the local area a more positive place; boosting local business and increasing the provision currently on offer to young people.

The public fund helps. We hope that this local fund removes some of the financial pressure from families, small organisations and local services set to get worse over the next financial year. It would be a tragedy to see wasted potential, so let us make the steps now to reduce the impact the recession will have on the lives of our local community. We as individuals cannot afford to fix the problems we see in our area, but as a community of £2 per month funders we can collectively set out to tackle some of these problems by providing secure and regular resources. Many large charities use this model so why not bring it down to a local level?

Can you help?