Can anyone help point me at some funds...

liveabiglife · March 8, 2008

My lad goes to a soccer training scheme run by Kidderminster Harriers. Mostly the scheme is run voluntarily, but they have a couple of staff and a van and equipment etc to fund.

The scheme is excellent - goes into the local schools, runs training every Saturday morning for 5 thru 14 year olds, and runs holiday soccer clubs. In the local freebie paper a couple of weeks ago there was an article saying they were out of funds. When KHFC were in League 2, the scheme got £30k a year which was enough, now they get zip because Harriers are in the BSP.

Talking to one of the coaches this morning, they have funds to carry them to the end of April, then it will have to fold. Why they waited until now to raise the issue I don't know, but I'm now involved in trying to help alleviate the current funding crisis. We are most likely going to ask parents to stump up some cash, try and arrange a dinner with a speaker to raise some funds and see if we can tap some local businesses up, but it's all short-term to give enough space to try and find a medium to long term fix. In the long-term, we need to find some funding support that can be relied on, probably a mixture of grants and sponsorship.

My question is this - does anyone know anyone, or someone who knows someone, for whom such a scheme is their funding thing? Does anyone know of specific grant-making bodies that support this type of work? Does anyone know a speaker for dinners who's good, and a name that's a reasonable draw, and may do an evening for free? I'm obviously going to be working to find out stuff myself, but as time is of the essence, I figured I'd throw the question out and see if anyone knew a way of getting our hands on some funds/services (fixing the van for free, for example) fast.

The scheme, unsurprisingly as it's run by KHFC, is based in Kidderminster, Worcs.

March 8, 2008

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