Pioneering Collaboration Hub Funded
25th May 2022
We are delighted to announce that ACTion with Communities in Cumbria (ACT) has secured funding from Esmee Fairburn Foundation to tackle some of the most enduring issues for communities in and around the Lake District.
With agreed actions from the Lake District National Park Partnership Plan now being delivered, this is a great time to build more transparent platforms for real conversation about the balances and challenges ahead.
Working closely with communities, campaigning groups, agencies and local authorities to establish a Collaboration Hub, we will test new approaches to difficult conversations to nurture better working relationships and better outcomes for all concerned.
ACT’s history of helping communities plan for the future and find the right people to work with has repeatedly drawn us into seemingly intractable, even combative conversations on a range of familiar topics. For instance, fair and affordable housing, transport and access to services, what’s right for our rural economy including the visitor economy, agriculture and the reality of sustainable, remote working in areas with poor broadband.
While there may be strategic plans in place to deliver services and maintain infrastructure, sometimes there are sticking points in the reality of recipient communities who often feel ‘done to’ rather than engaged with. We will trial more proactive and responsive ways for communities and agencies to work together.
The Collaboration Hub will resource some new ways of working to try looking at issues together differently. We will build on our recent positive experiences of using arts-based consultation to try out Audio Adventures or Playback Theatre, for example. This could be to address a specific point of tension, or as part of a community led plan where a community wants to try something a bit different to move a ‘stuck’ conversation forward. We have also included the opportunity to oversee a Citizens Panel, encouraging a truly participative approach to planning for the future.
This is a hugely exciting project from which we hope there will be considerable learning to share. The two-year agreement allows us to start on the sticky issues of concern right now, and also to respond to emerging challenges and opportunities, for example as the new Unitary Authorities take shape over the next twelve to eighteen months.
Please get in touch if you would like to know more about this work and how it could help you: franrichardson@cumbriaaction.org.uk