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Annual Report 2019 | Resilient Communities Stories

There was a number of different areas highlighted by stakeholders as part of the Resilient Communities workstream. This demonstrates the variety of understanding of what is meant by Resilient Communities. In 2018/19 partners have undertaken a vast array of activity that contributes to this agenda. Some of these are outlined below;

 

Volunteering

In 2018, the Glasgow Community Planning Partnership committed to the delivery of the refreshed Glasgow's Volunteering Strategy 2019-2024 and it's associated Action Plan. Volunteering is recognised by all partners as making a valuable contribution to the development of people, of communities and of our economy. The Strategy includes a focus on Partners signing up to the Glasgow Volunteer Charter. This Charter encourages Partners to undertake actions that will increase inclusive and appropriate volunteering both within their organisation and by their staff. To date, four of the Community Planning Partners have achieved the Charter Mark with more signed up to work towards this. We will continue to improve our support for volunteering.

 

Police Scotland Youth Volunteers

Police Scotland hosts a Youth Volunteer scheme that provides young people from any background the opportunity to come together as a team and promote good citizenship and positive youth role models. Volunteering takes place at community, local and national events. It provides an opportunity to improve interpersonal skills in a safe environment which helps prepares participants for employment or further education.

Glasgow Police Scotland Youth Volunteers (PSYV) started in 2014 with one group of 24 youth volunteers. Since then, the project has grown to 6 groups with approximately 120 youth volunteers. The project is supported by Glasgow City Council who provide meeting accommodation and transport to and from volunteering opportunities. Police Scotland is committed to the continuation of this project and to develop this further to ensure opportunities are accessible to all.

In 2015 a 15 year old boy from Syria joined Glasgow PSYV. He had extremely limited English and as a result of his background he felt isolated in his community which greatly affected his confidence. PSYV gave him the opportunity to feel like he belonged somewhere, it made him feel like part of a team and allowed him to create friendships in a safe environment. Through PSYV he was given many amazing opportunities such as parliamentary visits, the opportunity to travel and volunteer at national events, learn about Scots Laws and education which gave him an opportunity to be a peer mentor. He is now 18 years old and has just been accepted into Glasgow University for medical studies. Through PSYV he has developed a working relationship with Fearless.org, whereby he has used his own life experiences to help develop a platform which provides a safe, anonymous place for people with any language to learn about Scots law and third party reporting of crime.

 

Greater Community Engagement and Empowerment/Decision Making
Shaping and Designing Public Services

On a Thursday night in April, young people from across Greater Pollok gathered in Cineworld in Silverburn.

 

Over 600 people took part in the Greater Pollok PB event. 200 attended the 'big night in' with 630 voted on the Young Scot website. The participatory budgeting event designed to give local young people a voice in deciding how £200,000 will be spent in their area.

The Youth Television Group from South West Arts & Music Project (SWAMP) have organised this showcase event themselves to bring their peers together. But their talents don't stop there. They have used their media skills to create videos that raised awareness of Participatory Budgeting and the funds that were available and actively encouraged young people to get involved. They also made videos showcasing each of the projects that have made funding requests. These were shown on the big screen and live streamed through PBtv, hosted on the Young Scot website for anyone unable to attend.

Participants were then able to vote, either in the cinema or online using their Young Scot number. Andy Peline from SWAMP supported the young people throughout the process and has seen firsthand the impact it has had as young people see for themselves the difference they can make.

"This process has been challenging, but we have learned a lot from it and so have the young people. I think the biggest thing to come from this process, apart from these groups realising their dreams at a local level, is that now we have an established core group that have worked hard to make this happen. They will now develop The Greater Pollok Youth Forum, bringing in more people and developing a genuine voice that reflects the young people in the area rather than the views of an organisation, to help influence decisions and policies"

The PB work in Greater Pollok is just one of a number of Participatory Budgeting pilots that have taken place in Glasgow in 2018/ 19. Glasgow City Council committed to mainstream its PB activities and have worked with communities and the Third Sector develop a shared approach. Four pilots were undertaken in 2018/19 to see how this would work in practice, to learn from the experience and to make improvements on the process.

A total of £1m was provided for allocation across the pilots with each using different methods to publicise PB, support local people to get involved and to make decisions on how funds are used. Over 150 people were involved across the local panels established to deliver the PB pilots. Without these committed individuals PB wouldn't have happened. In total, over 1,500 local residents got involved in the PB processes in their area. Collectively they determined the allocation of over £600,000 worth of funding to 55 projects; local people making decisions on their local services.

You can find out more about what these are here;

As well as these pilot areas, Glasgow Disability Alliance were funded to support people with disabilities to get involved in the development and delivery of the PB process. You can read more about this here. http://gda.scot/content/publications/GDA-ParticipatoryBudgetingsmaller.pdf

Participants across the pilots will be invited to join a Citizens Panel to shape the future of PB in Glasgow.

These pilots have been instrumental in building capacity within our communities to participate in the whole PB process and to prepare for involvement in influencing mainstream budgets. They are also already influencing future practice with a number of further PB activities planned for 2019. Together, these activities will help to build a platform from which the Council can deliver on its commitment to allocate 1% of its budget through PB.

 

Thriving Places

There are nine Thriving Places communities identified across Glasgow. This is supplemented with an additional Locality Planning area; Govanhill. A summary of the progress made by this programme, and links to the successes within these communities can be found here.

 

Addressing Antisocial Behaviour - Safe Glasgow

The Safe Glasgow Partnership continues to deliver its scrutiny role with regard to the Local Police and Fire & Rescue Services Plans.  In addition the Partnership has oversight of the work of Community Justice, Youth Justice, Glasgow Violence Against Women Partnership and the Hate Crime Working Group and One Glasgow Reducing Offending.  Specific achievements in this reporting year includes; revising our governance and structures, creating a 'Guide to Scrutiny in Partnership' to support the role of the Group, and continuing the integral work to address Unwanted Fire Alarm Signals with a 3% reduction achieved in 2018-19.

 

Addressing Antisocial Behaviour - Community Justice

Our shared approach to reducing reoffending is delivered by the Glasgow Community Justice Partnership. The specific aim of this Partnership is to 'build protective factor'. This means improving the factors that it has been demonstrated influence re-offending behaviour; employability, education, health and wellbeing, and housing. The work undertaken by the Community Justice Partnership in 2017/18 is detailed in full here. The Community Justice Annual Report 2018/19 can be found pdf icon here [1Mb].