Hope for the future of Forum 28

A new vision for the future of Forum 28 is being supported by the Barrow Local Committee of Cumbria County Council. The committee wants to help the bid by Barrow's leading arts and theatre centre for a £45,000 Regional Arts Lottery grant which would provide Forum 28 with a new marketing strategy, a new corporate identity and rebranding, and a business plan. The Barrow committee was asked for £10,000 to help enable Forum 28 to make the lottery bid. Its decision was to encourage Forum 28 to make an application for the money to the Barrow Economic Initiatives Fund, which the local committee administers. 

County Councillor Alan Nicholson, chair of the Barrow Local Committee, said: 

"We see Forum 28 as a valuable asset to Barrow and to a wider community outside. It employs currently about 45 people full-time and the lottery bid will help secure those jobs and perhaps create more. "The local committee believes the most appropriate way to help further the lottery bid is to provide assistance through the Barrow Economic Initiatives Fund. The fund is there to sustain and aid the economic development of the area and we shall obviously be looking very favourably at the application." 

The Economic Initiatives Fund was established three years ago to assist community businesses, improve access for unemployed residents to the job market, and aid the small business community. It was launched again in 2002 by the local committee with a budget of £25,000, which has been recently increased to a total of £75,000 by matching funding of £50,000 won by the county from Furness Strategic Partnership's Neighbourhood Renewal Fund.