Nick Bird, Urban ForumDonna Roberts, Dudley MBCLorna Prescott, Dudley CVS

Urban Forum were concerned that the government’s new Community Rights would not be taken up equally between

different communities

We secured funding from Barrow

Cadbury for an action research

project to take place in Dudley in

conjunction with Dudley CVS (an Urban

Forum member)

Aims:• To assess the perceptions

of Dudley community groups with regard to Community Rights• To involve community

groups in planning how they could be implemented locally• To build better

relationships between the local authority and community groups

Approach:• Research plus

engagement• Co-design between

community groups and Dudley council• Use of community

venues, shared meals etc to encourage participation and ownership

Partners:• Urban Forum• Dudley CVS • Dudley Metropolitan

Council• Dudley Community

Partnership

Testing the appetite for Community

Rights(August & September 2011)

Seven focus groups were held to dig deeper into issues around services, assets and neighbourhood planning and to recruit people into the next

stage of the project

We carried out surveys at events and an online survey amongst community groups in Dudley to test awareness of, and appetite for, Community Rights. We also asked about barriers to take up and support needs.

Digging deeper (September & October

2011)

In two ‘Community Kitchen’ workshops participants heard inspiring stories of community projects from across the world and learned about tools and techniques for asset led community development

An ‘Our Society Our Solutions’ group was set up

and met three times to generate proposals around assets and service delivery

based on what we had learned from our research

Getting some inspiration

(November 2011)

Coming up with our own recipes

(November 2011 to January 2012)

M.A.S.H

The OSOS group’s proposals were framed within the concept of MASH – Managing Assets and Services Holistically.

This was based around principals of collaborative working and using ALL assets more effectively

Tasting session with decision makers

(February 2012)

Members of OSOS and the project steering group met with

members of Dudley Council’s Corporate Board (including the

Chief Executive) to discuss proposals and seek agreement

for going forward

0 25 50 75 100

Right to Build

Right to Challenge

Right to Buy

Neighbourhood Planning

A great dealThe basicsLittle or nothing

Testing the appetite: our survey

How much do you feel you know about...

Appetite was low. Perhaps due to gaps in knowledge. There was some curiosity and interest, as well as concerns and suggestions of what barriers might be.

“I think the thing is, in Dudley you won’t have groups that have got

enough money to buy anything by themselves. And if the windows of opportunity to buy are quite tight, you’re not going to have enough time to form the partnerships or put in the bids to get funding to

enable you to do it. So they might be giving us a right, but it’s a right that is not practically workable for

groups in Dudley.”

“I’m just wondering whether there might be a way of saying, ‘Well, do we

have to go as far as a challenge?’... how would the council feel about working with us to bring that into

the community, avoiding the actual process of the

challenge and the tender?’”

Digging deeper: focus groups

Getting some inspiration: workshops with Tessy Britton

Coming up with our own recipes: Our Society Our Solutions group

Checking back: follow up survey

Awareness of community rights had increased over the 8 months, and appetite had increased. The final survey reinforced the action research discussions - suggesting that there was a far greater appetite for involvement in service design, and for using buildings and land through a whole range of arrangements.

0 25 50 75 100

Right to Challenge

Right to Bid

Aware and am interested in using the opportunityAware/heard ofNot aware

MASH Lab Launch event in AprilPiloting the restaurant with a tasting menu

Fusion cuisine a whole system approach

MASH Lab event in JulyBringing chefs together

We are creative: connecting many new and existing resources and ideas to make entirely new things.

We are collaborative: boosting the potential and success of our work by collective and collaborative ways of working.

We are empowering:our approach to collaboration is uses the 5 Community Empowerment Dimensions.

We are learning:social learning, whole systems, reflection and evaluation are being embedded in our approach.

A moveable feast!

We’re linking our MASH prompted approach and projects to related activity in Dudley which is using asset based, whole system, empowering and collaborative approaches.

‣East Coseley Big Local‣Ageing Well‣Community-led asset

based wellbeing projects (JNSA/JSAA)

Enabling collaboration

In September 2012 we bought together people who could take on roles as enablers of collaboration.

We now have enablers supporting 6 collaborative projects working towards our community wellbeing outcomes.

We’re busy MASHing!

www.communityrightsdudley.wordpress.com

www.creativecollaborationdudley.wordpress.com