Investing in sustainable communities

We are delighted to approve plans to extend our community investment approach across the whole of our operating area, following impressive results in our Gloucestershire communities.

Janette Vizard, our current grants and social value officer, has been working in our Gloucestershire neighbourhoods ever since Severn Vale merged with Bromford back in January 2019. In 2021, Janette (below) worked closely with multiple charities through 160 separate projects and helped local charities and organisations secure over £1m funding in that 12 month period.

Janette’s work has seen mainstream charities, community groups, churches, schools, and nurseries all benefit from the collaborative approach. And that funding often goes directly to customers through care for the elderly initiatives, youth outreach projects, food parcels, community events and activities, and equipment such as furniture, carpets, fridges, and freezers. It complements the community building already taking place through our 227 neighbourhood coaches out on patch.

“If we’re in an area that has quite a few homes, then to help that community what we need to do is help the organisations and charities that are in that community,” Janette explains.

“Some organisations do community investment by helping with activities for children, putting on ICT support, or improving areas such as painting fences, whereas here at Bromford we’re far more about enabling others to thrive and one of the ways we do that is by actively building relationships and supporting the organisations and charities who help our customers along the way. It’s a real collaboration and further brings our coaching approach to life through our localities way of working.”

Capitalise

One success story was Brockworth Library, near Gloucester, which is close to a large number of Bromford customers. Thanks to £166,000 funding which Janette helped secure, the space was completely refurbished and upgraded with a new modern, flexible space being created, activities for all ages, and 30 new volunteers.

Bromford has now decided to expand this approach by recruiting ‘a new Janette’ to create two full-time community capacity builders. Moving forward, the two positions will capitalise on the great work started in Gloucestershire and work with charities and community groups stretching over our whole operating area. A new community grants initiative for customers will also be launched this year and more details will be released on that in due course.

Janette added: “It’s fantastic that we are investing in this. It’s important, rewarding work, and I think people have seen what we can achieve by working in collaboration with the charities and organisations who invest so heavily in our customers. At some point, we will probably need to grow even further as we develop our customer offer.”

Do you think you could be our new Janette? The role is likely to go out for recruitment in the next couple of months so keep your eyes peeled on our jobs pages if you think you have what it takes.

Contact us for more info

If you know a local charity or organisation that could benefit from extra funding, we're here to help - https://www.bromford.co.uk/contact-us/