Neighbourhood Planning Grant

The council has established a Neighbourhood Plan Grant Scheme to support the development of Neighbourhood Plans in the district. The fund is intended to complement the national Neighbourhood Planning funding available from Locality, and is available to parish and town councils that still need additional funding to meet their project costs.

Who can apply?

The fund is available to any town or parish council in the district that is developing a Neighbourhood Plan.

We will help to fund costs associated with the development of the Neighbourhood Plan, such as:

• printing costs
• venue hire
• communication and publicity costs
• document design/printing/distribution costs
• consultancy costs

We would expect that the town/parish council has already had its intended Neighbourhood Area designated by us in advance of applying for a grant.

We will only consider funding any costs associated with existing staff time, for example town/parish clerk, where this is for additional hours to those specified in the current town/parish council employment contract.

We will not fund work that has already been carried out, nor will we fund party political or religious promotion or social parties and excursions.

Successful applicants may not make any further applications to this fund.

How much is available?

Applicants can apply for a maximum of £6,000 towards the development of their Neighbourhood Plan.

Decisions

We will endeavour to make a decision on your grant application within two weeks of it being received. If successful, an offer letter will be sent to you which should be signed and returned to the council within 10 working days.

Successful applicants may claim 75% of the grant up-front, on signing and returning their offer letter. The remaining 25% can be claimed once the Neighbourhood Plan reaches the pre-submission consultation and publicity stage required by Regulation 14 of the Neighbourhood Planning (General) Regulations 2012. We expect this to be within 12 months of the date of the grant offer.

The council reserves the right to reclaim any monies that have been allocated should it have reason to believe a project has deviated from the conditions and details set out in the application and offer letter. Similarly, if a project is delivered under budget the council reserves the right to reduce its grant proportionally. 

How to apply

If you would like to express your interest in applying to the fund and request an application form,  please contact us using the details below.