The Communities within the Carrigaline Electoral Area which includes the catchments of Douglas, Carrigaline, Crosshaven and Ballincollig and Lenenagh are to benefit in the coming years as a result of their inclusion in the Community Funding Plans being developed by East Cork Area Development (ECAD) Ltd.
A Government decision towards the end of May 2007 to ask ECAD to support community and small enterprise projects in the Carrigaline Electoral Area was quickly followed up with a series of over a dozen meetings in the communities to help identify projects that could be developed by the communities in the coming years. There have also been community elections involving over forty community groups which saw four community representatives duly elected onto the Board of ECAD from the Carrigaline Electoral Area.
Much of the focus in 2008 will be to bring forward as much information and ideas about community priorities in the Carrigaline Electoral Area so that this can be added to the body of information collated by ECAD over the past decade in the East Cork Area. This will then be utilised in putting together the Community Funding Plans that are submitted to Government to consider providing resources for local projects for a period of up to six years.
Ryan Howard, ECAD manager explains ‘We have been delighted with the response we are getting from people right across the area. We understand that communities are anxious to get funding quickly but they also have shown great understanding because the funds that may become available are based on the ability of an area like South and East Cork to develop a high quality plan to be sent to Government which will have a clear set of priorities and needs and show how funds would be used.’
‘We have already begun to use the information provided to us to submit a Plan for Rural Transport for South & East Cork. We are currently only one of four new areas, together with County Galway, Donegal and County Louth, to be asked to forward plans for our areas. Rural Transport will benefit people in remote and rural areas with poor access to Public or Private Transport. We have also submitted funding applications under the Dormant Accounts Scheme for Integration Projects across South and East Cork and also this month we have forwarded a plan for projects involving older people, part of which is based on transferring a project that we created a while back called the ‘Silver Surfers’, older people learning to surf the web to keep in contact with friends and family and in some cases establish small neighbourhood Silver Surfer Clubs.
We are also busy collecting more information. With the help of a group of experts called ‘Exodea Europe’ we are working with communities and agencies that deal with some of the most disadvantaged groups within the area. This work will help shape a ‘Six Year Social Inclusion Plan’ that we hope to be submitting for funding before the end of 2008’.
