Flintshire communities boosted by stage two of £1.1 million regeneration fund

Towns and villages across Flintshire can benefit from a near £400,000 fund to upgrade their local communities – but they need to act fast.

It’s a second helping of the Flintshire Community Key Fund being distributed by Cadwyn Clwyd and the Flintshire Local Voluntary Council and comes hot on the heels of an initial fund worth £775,000.

Over 50 community groups and organisations from across the county took advantage of Stage One of the Community Key Fund, and Stage Two takes the total for the county to over £1.1 million, part of a wider suite of projects managed by Flintshire County Council and funded from the UK Shared Prosperity Fund.

Applications for the latest slice of funding from a pot worth £375,000 have to be in by Sunday, June 8, and Cadwyn Clwyd Community Enterprise Manager Helen Williams said: “We had a tremendous response to the first set of funding and it proved amazingly popular and we’re expecting a similar response.

“There will be grants of up to £35,000 for a wide range of community projects from regenerating village halls, sports facilities, green spaces and gardens to renewable energy generation, waste management and arts and cultural schemes.

“There will also be grants of up to £5,000 for pre-project work such as feasibility studies and specialist consultancy reports.

“The first phase proved hugely popular and was massively over-subscribed which shows the need and the effectiveness of this kind of community support for local people to build resilience in communities across both urban and rural Flintshire.”

Working alongside Helen is Shaun Darlington of Flintshire Local Voluntary Council, who said: “The first phase was extremely popular. The groups themselves were very grateful and the outcomes were brilliant.

“This time it is a short window for the scheme and groups will have to be ready to go with their projects because they only have until November 30 to complete them.

“It is always important that if people have any queries they pick up the phone and contact Helen or me because our role is to help them through the process.”

The first phase of the Community Key Fund saw 53 projects across Flintshire receiving grants for a wide range of projects from £2,900 for replacement tables at Llanasa Village Hall to £47,000 for new flooring indoors and astro-turf outdoors at Connah’s Quay Cricket Club.

The money comes from the Shared Prosperity Fund, administered by the UK Government, which announced in their Autumn Budget a further £900 million of funding for local investment by March 2026.

• For more information contact Helen Williams, Cadwyn Clwyd, on 01490 340500, email: [email protected] or go to http://cadwynclwyd.co.uk/ or Shaun Darlington, Flintshire Local Voluntary Council, on 01352 744027.

Picture by Mandy Jones Photography