Community Engagement

 We have supported residents in two areas of Brentwood to establish a neighbourhood based action group. These groups had the purpose of tackling crime, anti-social behaviour and environmental issues in that area. These groups are comprised of residents, ward councillors and local agency representatives who have a joint responsibility for designing local responses to issues.

Key to our approach is the establishment of steering groups which engage in holistic problem solving cycles using our SPARE wheel approach. These steering groups co-ordinate, prioritise, deliver and performance manage identified actions. Critically these action plans were locally appropriate according to jointly defined need and are jointly owned by residents and agencies.

We supported the development of these groups embedding the core principles of democracy and transparency through the process as a way of promoting effective governance.

Before the development of the action plans we provided Open Awards accredited training for residents and agency representatives. This training covered Environmental Problem Solving techniques and legislation including providing training in environmental auditing and presentation techniques.

In the Pilgrims Hatch area this has led to the local residents forming a sustainable Environmental Audit team who regularly conduct audits of their local area. This work led us to be a finalist for the 2011 UK Housing Awards by Inside Housing Magazine in the Involving and Empowering Communities category. We continued this work in Pilgrims Hatch in 2016 training further residents and piloting an online database to collate audit data. This work was for the Pilgrims Hatch Environmental Partnership and was funded from an Awards for All Lottery grant.

Additionally we were re-commissioned by Brentwood to roll-out this approach across the borough. The aim of that commission being to provide community activists with enhanced skills and knowledge assisting them in prioritising actions.

We were commissioned by Birmingham City Council’s Neighbourhood Development and Support Unit to undertake an evaluation of the Celebrating Communities programme. 

This fund was instigated to enable community groups and communities across Birmingham to celebrate the Commonwealth Games. Grants were made available to groups, over 300 in total, across the city to undertake activities the themes being related to the Commonwealth Games. A support programme to enable groups to bid and participate was also put in place.

We evaluated the impact of the programme and the processes used identifying lessons learnt. This covered the application process, support programme and the approval process. 

We consulted with a variety of stakeholders involved including beneficiaries, local councillors, representatives from the Commonwealth Games legacy team, the NDSU team members along with representatives from the organisations providing the support. 

The final report outlined the lessons learnt and provided a series of recommendations.

  We were commissioned by Birmingham City Council to undertake an interim and final evaluation of their Local Innovation Fund. This £2m fund was set up to enable local community based projects to be developed which had an emphasis on enabling different ways of working such as collaboration between groups. The fund also was designed to ensure projects met local ward and city-wide priorities. A key element of the evaluation was to judge the extent to which councillors worked with residents and known constituted community groups to prepare proposals along with establishing whether innovative delivery models have been established.

To assess the extent to which projects had incorporated innovation in their design and implementation we developed a five component model. These five components, if all in place, would mean that a project could be seen to be innovative in its design. 

The evaluation combined consultations with project representatives, councillors and officers managing the fund with the development of a range of good practice case studies from across the city.

The report included lessons learnt from the process along with recommendations on the future design of community based service delivery and governance and on the role of councillors in relation to their community leadership role.

The final report included a greater focus on the outcomes achieved by the projects and the programme itself. This examined the wider impacts made such as on service design and delivery, in developing the capacity of projects and individuals and on different models of sustaining the projects. A wide range of conclusions and recommendations were made including those relating to the future direction of neighbourhood work in the city and the need to share good practice and models of work.

We were commissioned in 2021 to undertake an evaluation of this project by Birmingham City Council. The project was aimed at connecting communities in Birmingham, to have a better understanding of different faiths and culture and providing a better start for Eastern European communities.

A key aspect of the programme was the development of Community Champions from Eastern European communities who both would provide advice and information to other community members and undertake project work. These projects and advice did have a focus upon Covid support along with assisting with settled status concerns. However community safety concerns and developing an effective response to ASB also featured.
 

The evaluation involved consultations with the commissioner, delivery organisations, community champions and beneficiaries along with a review of project monitoring information and implementation plans. 

The final report contained a number of recommendations relating to future project design, management and delivery along with describing case studies of practice.

 We were commissioned by Birmingham City Council’s Neighbourhood Development and Support Unit in 2021 to undertake a review of the Pioneer Places Programme. 

The Pioneer Places Programme was designed to pilot new working approaches and ways of operating across the city. The areas that would be selected to be Pioneer Places were to be ones which were already undertaking good work. In particular the aim was that the selected areas/organisations should be able to demonstrate good neighbourhood working and/or demonstrate that they were delivering innovative or unique practice.

Due to the continuing Covid-19 pandemic and the associated social distancing measures (including cessation of public gatherings) we used a methodology focussed on remote elements. The desire to provide as much opportunity for representatives from each Pioneer Place, local councillors and officers involved in the process to contribute was a key element of the methods used.

The methodology therefore comprised the following elements:

• Semi-structured interviews with the Neighbourhood Development and Support Unit team members;
• Online survey open to Birmingham City Council Councillors and senior officers who had been involved in the programme, which received ten responses;
• Group or one-to-one consultations with representatives from each of the Pioneer Places. These were held either via telephone or using Zoom/Teams online discussions;
• On-line survey with other residents and stakeholders who had been involved in the programme including those participating in the networking meetings; and
• Document review of the original Pioneer Places applications and associated documentation.

A series of conclusions and recommendation were made drawing on the analysis undertaken. These were based within the context of the existing arrangements in Birmingham especially the status of current neighbourhood working.

Linxs Consultancy was commissioned in January 2020 to carry out an interim 360-degree review of Birmingham City Council ward forum meetings and ward plans. The concept of the ward forum meeting is embedded in local governance arrangements and at the heart of Birmingham’s own White Paper on “Working Together in Birmingham’s Neighbourhoods,” as a mechanism for local councillors to embrace their local leadership role and maximise the potential for community involvement within ward planning processes.

The methodology comprised:

• Semi-structured interviews and group sessions with the Neighbourhood Development and Support Unit (NDSU) team;
• Online survey open to all Birmingham City Council Councillors;
• Councillors were also invited to have a fuller telephone interview with a member of the research team;
• Document review of existing ward plans, action plans and supporting NDSU documentation;
• Online survey with residents and stakeholders who had previously attended ward forum meetings; and
• A comparative analysis of ward forum structures in Manchester and Bristol conducted via telephone interview and email exchange.

This methodology was amended from that originally planned to take into account the social distancing requirements due to Covid-19.

The final report contained a range of conclusions and recommendations. The recommendations were aimed at enhancing the effectiveness of the forums and ward planning process including in relation to gaining a greater involvement of local communities.

 We completed a contract for Rochdale's Public Service Reform Board developing an evaluation framework for their Public Service Reform Pilot. The pilo,t focussed on the Kirkholt area of the borough, aimed to deliver culture change for residents and the workforce in delivering local services.

The evaluation framework developed as a result of the contract incorporated a range of methods and processes designed to assess whether the project aims have been achieved. Crucially though the framework has also been designed to capture the learning from the pilot and lessons learnt.

We made a number of recommendations to enable the project team to undertake evaluation throughout the pilot's life. These included the potential for capture of case studies, use of a self-assessment framework and the tracking of achievements.

 We were awarded a place on North Yorkshire County Council's framework contract to provide support for groups delivering services under their stronger communities programme.

This specialist support was relating to services being delivered in a number of areas across the county. The support for groups was in relation to governance, service delivery and measuring performance.