Issue - meetings

Agreement was sought for the Council’s forward funding profile to ensure the CRF projects could be paid in a timely manner from the Council’s reserves, with financial reconciliation taking place at the end of the CRF programme delivery.

The Derbyshire Dales and High Peak local authority areas were confirmed as priority places for UK CRF funding.  The County Council was confirmed as the ‘lead authority’ for processing the CRF and invited project proposals from a range of local applicants, carried out project appraisal and produce a shortlist of proposals up to a maximum of £3 million.  Two of the Council’s shortlisted projects had been successful in being allocated CRF monies – Appendix 2 gave full details.

An urgent decision by the Executive Director – Place was taken to accept the grant funding and commence the process for implementing the necessary management processes.  The payment of the CRF monies to the Council would be in two payments. The Council was required to ‘forward fund’ the projects once the initial payment (£1,249,473) had been made and in advance of the second payment (£749,684).  Appropriate monitoring and evaluation processes had been set up to check project progress and ensure outputs were being achieved.

RESOLVED - to agree to the Council underwriting the second half of the Government grant (£749,684) and making payments to projects in line with agreed profiles, from the Council’s own resources with reconciliation taking place on receipt of the second Community Renewal Fund payment from Government.