By leading a thriving network of partner organisations, together we will aim to reduce food and income poverty and increase skills and financial capabilities.
2024 Highlights
We operated the Communities Looking Forward grants programme for another year, which resulted in grants totalling £140,000 given to 25 organisations across the town. These organisations came from a wide variety of sectors in the town - from sports clubs including LGC Bowls Club and LGC Cricket Club, to the culture sector such as Letchworth Festival and Create CiC - and benefited thousands of residents.
We also made significant investment focusing on reducing food and income poverty. This included grants totalling £22,500 to organisations including Letchworth Foodbank and Let’s Make Lunch, who offered holiday food and provision for families in the town. Through funded work with partners, we have also been able to support residents on lower incomes with home and family essentials.
Knowing that the school summer holidays can be a challenging time for families, we developed Hello Holidays – a calendar of free, low-cost cost and discounted activities and ideas for families for the 6-week holidays. Play! Discover! Share! at Broadway Gallery provided a drop-in space and programme of free activities for local families.
Delivery Against Measures
In Strategy 2028, we committed to working in partnership to reduce food and income poverty, and to increase skills and financial capability in the town. Through our partnership working, our funding of local organisations, and looking at how people can access what we offer as an organisation, we have made great progress towards this aim.
We will continue to learn from our long-term partnership work in this area and identify new opportunities and initiatives in line with a new policy in 2025.
We aim to double the level of funding for tackling poverty to £400k by 2026. Our funding level for this area in 2024 was £263,500, and we are already looking at opportunities to increase this level in 2025.
2025 Priorities
- Continue to work in partnership with Citizens Advice North Herts on the Letchworth Financial Health Project, supporting people to develop their financial capability.
- Build on data and insights from 2024, bringing together key partners to focus on supporting under-25s around skills and economic inactivity.
- Bring back Hello Holidays and Play! Discover! Share! for 2025, working with key partners across the town to publicise free and low-cost opportunities and provide spaces for families, children and young people over the summer holidays.
