Selective updates below from attendance at recent Council and KVA chaired Covid Recovery Task Force meetings. Make sure your local green group is on KEF's emailing list so that you get the news promptly, and subscribe to Kingston Environment News to to get other news of environmental events and activities.
KVA Green Funding Collaborative: this small group, brought together by KEF and KVA, has now completed its first task, creating a survey to inform KVA and others about local green groups, their work and their aspirations for funding. Local environmental organisations, large and small, interested in applying for funding for green projects in Kingston were invited to join the Kingston Green Funding Collaborative by completing a short survey to help KVA to pass on relevant funding opportunities as they arose. We hope this will help green groups to access the funds they need, and also that survey responses may enable collaborations on some green projects and funding applications, as well as reminding groups of all the information and processes they need to have in order when aoplying for funding.
The first phase of the roll-out collected some useful info from the environmental groups that responded, and asked some searching and thought-provoking questions. If your group could answer yes to all the questions in the survey you probably have all the information needed for funding applications to hand; if not we plan to add some useful sources of help – so we are tweaking the questionnaire a bit before rolling it out further. Watch this space.
Kingston Community Lottery - Good Cause Launch, Thursday 1 July, 3.00 – 4.00pm, on-line. Local good causes can find out more and register for this event here.
People's Postcode Lottery's virtual funding workshop, July 22nd, 10.00 am, Zoom - good causes in Kingston & Surbiton are invited to learn how to apply for funding and hear from the People’s Postcode Lottery charities team and local MP Ed Davey. RSVP to reserve a place.
Community hubs - an opportunity for Kingston green groups? There are empty and underused properties and spaces all over Kingston (see, for example Kingstonfirst's vacant units project), and plenty of good green ideas for using them - are there any green groups out there that could use a vacant unit creatively and sustainably and turn their deas into action?
A reminder about Kingston Voluntary Action training: affordable / free training, designed specifically for the voluntary sector - topics from First Aid to Crowdfunding + some tailor-made ones. KVA also offer free easy to use websites to community groups. Find out more at https://kva.org.uk/our-services/events-training/
New Council Portfolio Holder for Environment: amongst recent reshuffles at RBK, the Portfolio Holder for Environment and Sustainable Transport will now be Cllr Stephanie Archer (Chessington North and Hook ward), with responsibilities for most of the issues KEF members will be interested in, including: Environment, Air Quality, Biodiversity, Open Spaces, Transport, Highways and Street Scene, Parking, Cycling/walking/healthy streets.
Covid - Covid regs remain in place for now, restricting numbers for various activities and venues, especially indoor ones - check the current rules and advice here. Kingston is a bit of a Covid hot-spot, so please observe the rules and stay safe.
Coordinating KEF: any KEF member-group interested in taking this over this role, which has plenty of scope for expansion and networking, can find out more about the role here and/or contact Marilyn,current coordinator, who would like to stand down and hand over before the end of 2021.