04/11/03 - Aid for Parishes : Cumbria County Council

Carlisle Local Committee of Cumbria County Council is again joining Carlisle City Council in making money available for capital grants to parish councils and village hall committees. The local committee has agreed to match the £20,000 made available by the city council, as it did last year.

The money is administered by Carlisle Parish Council Association. Many of the grants it made last year were spent on repairs and improvements to village halls, but also for such items as a village notice board, car park resurfacing and repairs to a war memorial.

The local committee is also helping parishes in the rural areas of Carlisle to speed up work on their parish plans. The committee has decided to give aid totalling £9,520 to six parish councils.

Parish plans, which identify and prioritise the needs of the areas they cover, are used by parish councils to win funding for local projects. They are essential to qualify for funding under the Countryside Agency’s Vital Villages scheme. However, parish councils often find it difficult to pay for consultation work and experts’ fees to draw up a parish plan in the first place.

The Carlisle Local Committee agreed to distribute £10,000 budgeted for supporting Vital Village bids to parish councils developing or intending to develop parish plans as follows: