Revenue Grant Scheme 2025-2027 – closed

This scheme closed for applications midday Friday 1 November 2024

Are you a constituted voluntary or community organisation looking for core revenue funding to help build and support thriving communities and improve the quality of life for the residents of South Oxfordshire?

If so, we are keen to fund organisations who deliver services/activities that will directly benefit and meet a clearly identified need for South Oxfordshire residents. We will favour organisations who are actively exploring partnership/joint working with other voluntary organisations, businesses or the public sector and/or other methods to help them to become more financially sustainable and have a greater impact in the communities they serve.

We encourage applications that make a positive contribution towards equality, diversity and inclusion. Applicants must also consider the climate and ecological implications of their service.

The services/activities must contribute to at least one of the council’s externally focussed emerging Corporate Plan priorities:

Action on climate change and nature recovery
Inclusion, accessibility and accountability
Thriving and healthy communities
Homes and infrastructure that meet local need

How much is available and what can it be used for?

We have a provisional budget available of £667,992 to allocate to organisations over the two-year period (£333,996 per year). This is subject to annual approval by the council when setting its budget.

You can apply for a minimum grant of £10,000 and a maximum of £125,000 per annum, over the two-year period. We will limit awards to a maximum of one third (33.33 per cent) of an organisation’s total operating costs in the most recent financial year (2023/24). If your service covers a wider area (i.e., Oxfordshire) or the organisation is not locally based, the costs will need to be pro-rata to South Oxfordshire.

We will fund core revenue costs such as, salaries, rent, rates, utilities and staff training.

Please read our funding guidance below to help identify further revenue expenditure for community grant purposes, a useful checklist to help prepare your application and FAQs, which you can access and download below.

Funding guidance 2025-27

Application checklist

FAQs

F or ideas of what previous revenue grants have funded, please refer to our list of grants awarded

Return to an existing application

IMPORTANT: There is one round of funding and applications will be scored once. All eligible applicants will be invited to the Community Grants Panel in February 2025 to present their revenue project. A decision in principle will be made by the Community Grants Panel within 16 weeks of the closing date and then a formal decision will be made.

We are unable to accept requests to amend applications once they have been submitted, however we must be informed if your financial position changes after submission.

Who can apply?

Any local constituted voluntary sector organisation delivering services that will benefit residents of South Oxfordshire.

Who isn’t eligible?

Town/parish councils
Other statutory bodies, or organisations providing a service on behalf of a statutory body
Unincorporated groups and associations
Education providers (schools, free schools, academies, colleges, PTAs and similar)
Profit-based businesses (private businesses)
Political and lobbying groups
Nationwide organisations (except where they have a local constitution and/or local bank account. We may also make exceptions if the services/activities clearly relate to a local hub/branch of the organisation)

Equalities

The council is committed to promoting equality and diversity and welcomes applications from all sectors of the community, regardless of race, gender, disability, sexual orientation, age, status, religion or belief. We encourage all applicants to make their projects as inclusive and accessible to all as possible.

If you need any of our documents in a different format, please email equalities@southandvale.gov.uk

Get in touch

We would welcome any questions about the scheme and we are happy to hold a one-to-one meeting to discuss whether your organisation or the project is eligible, so please do drop us an email at grants@southandvale.gov.uk.