Modern technology is transforming Councils’ Community and Shared Prosperity Fund grant-making

whatimpact.com sets a new standard for transparent, democratic, and streamlined VCSE funding with Newport City Council

Newport City Council has launched three Shared Prosperity Fund grant schemes for charities, social enterprises, and local community groups (VCSEs)  by harnessing modern platform technology whatimpact.com for the grant-making process. The platform ensures a seamless, transparent, and democratic grant application and evaluation process. The council is distributing over £800,000 in sports, culture, and heritage SPF grants to support their future vision of an ‘Ambitious, Fairer, Greener Newport For Everyone’. The platform gives equal opportunity for different kinds of organisations and projects to apply comparably, and to report on SPF-aligned outcomes using whatimpact’s social impact reporting and steering group analytics dashboard. This modern grant-making technology is now being rolled out to other councils. whatimpact is committed to making sure the target outcomes of community grants will be met.

Newport City Council has taken a new approach to grant-making by harnessing modern platform technology whatimpact.com, combined with hands-on support to ensure a wide range of organisations apply for GOV SPF grants from £1,000 to £30,000/project. “It is widely recognised that the traditional grant-making process is daunting and time-consuming for applicants. They have to fill in long applications, which in many cases require professional grant-writing skills – outside of the scope that many VCSEs have. Evaluation processes are hard to keep unbiased, as applications lack comparability in data. Finally, when it is time to report on the impact of projects, and council to provide audit-ready data, vast amounts of time and money are being spent on putting together the necessary data. whatimpact has built efficient technology for both grant-matching and evaluation processes – a scalable model for any council to use.”, whatimpact CEO Tiia Sammallahti explains the background of the innovation. 

Newport City Council wishes to engage with VCSEs with innovative projects and social interventions through whatimpact’s nationwide VCSE marketplace technology where all Newport relevant social interventions can join for free. whatimpact.com uses Charity Commission, Companies House, and 360Giving data to build VCSE profiles and allows them to present their work and case studies in a transparent and equal manner. The process of applying for grants is significantly easier and less time-consuming than traditional grant-making application processes tend to be. Grantees will also use the platform to report on the success of their projects. whatimpact offers also one-on-one support for all applicants, both online and in-person. Furthermore, whatimpact is collaborating widely with Newport-related VCSE support organisations such as Community Connectors, GAVO, and Newport Live on promoting the grant programmes and providing additional support for VCSEs e.g. establishing governance or setting up a bank account for new initiatives. 

Check Newport City Council's grant-making profile on whatimpact.com  HERE

whatimpact.com is a social impact start-up backed by the UK GOV (Innovate UK). The company offers comprehensive technology solutions for the public and private sectors to collaborate with VCSEs efficiently. whatimpact.com is the leading Social Value Brokerage in the UK. In addition to the grant-making system, the company offers solutions for social value delivery for public sector procurement. 

*SPF
The UK Shared Prosperity Fund is a central pillar of the UK government’s ambitious levelling up agenda and a significant component of its support for places across the UK. It provides £2.6 billion of new funding for local investment by March 2025, with all areas of the UK receiving an allocation from the fund via a funding formula rather than a competition. It will help places right across the country deliver enhanced outcomes and recognise that even the most affluent parts of the UK contain pockets of deprivation and need support. Newport City Council's focus for sports, culture and heritage grants is to enhance the social fabric and sense of local pride in Newport. This is done through investment in activities that enhance physical, cultural and social ties and access to amenities. The aim is to target funds to support equal opportunity and build resilient, healthy and safe neighbourhoods. 

For more information, visit www.gov.uk/government/publications/uk-shared-prosperity-fund-prospectus

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Danielle Bazuaye, Marketing Coordinator