A Stoke-on-Trent sport group has been awarded £3,000 from the Police and Crime Commissioner’s People Power Fund to encourage young people to take part in activities.
Engage Communities has been awarded the funding to set up three football tournaments at Dimensions Leisure Centre to make a positive impact on disadvantaged young people, aged nine to 25, in the surrounding area.
As part of his commitment to local communities, the Commissioner is providing £500,000 in 2015/16 through the People Power Fund in the form of grants of between £100 and £3,000. The fund is supporting locally-driven community safety activities in communities throughout Staffordshire and Stoke-on-Trent.
Mr Ellis said: “The Commissioner’s People Power Fund puts half a million pounds back into local communities and is easy and simple to apply for.
“This project helps to bring young people together and give them a chance to keep active.”
“It was great to see all of the football pitches full of young people which shows that there is a real need for activities like this.”
“It is important to engage with young people which means we can intervene early to tackle the problem of anti-social behaviour.”
Yaser Mir, founder and director of Engage Communities, said: “The funding has allowed us to provide three football tournaments in the north of the city. We have had two six-a-side tournaments already with over 300 young people involved on both occasions.
“The funding has helped to pay for equipment, venue hire and staff and we are now planning a date for the third tournament.
“We have had support from Port Vale who have given us match day tickets for prizes and provided us with trophies and the footballs we use are fair trade ones.
“The main aim of the tournaments is to keep kids off the streets and bring people together from different areas where they can interact in a positive environment and learn about each other.”
The People Power Fund is one part of £2.5 million of Commissioner’s Community Funding for 2014/15. The Commissioner’s Locality Deal Fund has allocated money to local areas through working in partnership with local district and borough councils. Meanwhile, the Commissioner’s Proceeds of Crime Fund is seeing 100 per cent of funding received by Staffordshire Police going back into local communities, through grants of between £3,000 and £15,000. It is made up of money seized from criminals as Staffordshire Police continue to strip offenders of their assets.
Successful projects in all three funding streams will deliver what’s important to local people based on the four priorities set out in the Commissioner’s Safer, Fairer, United Communities Strategy – tackling the root causes of crime through early intervention, supporting victims and witnesses better, reducing reoffending and increasing public confidence.
