Organisations which help to prevent crime and protect communities in Merseyside are being invited to apply for a share of a fund aimed at helping building stronger, safer communities.
This is the fifth year that Merseyside’s Police Commissioner Jane Kennedy has opened the Crime Prevention Fund which is used to help charities, community groups and social enterprises stop problems before they occur, by reducing the opportunities for crime and by deterring people away from becoming involved in anti-social and criminal behaviour.
A total of £135,000 is available from the fund and the Commissioner is inviting groups to submit bids of between £5,000 and £25,000 for innovative community safety projects or schemes that will run over the next 12 months. For the last three years, the Commissioner has specifically urged organisations that are working to tackle the underlying causes of serious and organised crime to apply for funding and this has again been made a priority for this round of funding.
Jane said: “Serious and organised crime is, for many people in our region, their greatest concern. It blights our communities, bringing misery and harm and causing decent, ordinary people to live in fear.
“Merseyside Police allocates extensive resources to tackling this issue, but we cannot simply ‘police’ our way of this issue. We need to work with all our partners, particularly those in the community and voluntary sector to address the deep-seated, and often complex, causes of serious violence.
“Local people understand their communities better than anyone and know what will work best to improve their area. We are fortunate to have a wealth of voluntary and community groups which are working hard to prevent people, especially young people from getting involved with this type of crime and I want to hear from them.
“Through the Crime Prevention Fund, I want to see what more can be done to tackle this issue and with these grants I hope I can give organisations which are trying to address the root causes of this issue a valuable cash boost which will help to make a difference to communities across Merseyside.”
Last year, 14 grassroots organisations were chosen to share £135,000 from the Crime Prevention Fund from a total of 75 bids submitted. Many of the projects focused on preventing young people from getting involved with crime.