Our Supporters
Since March 2020 we have been awarding grants from our specialist Coronavirus funds, and other funds at the Foundation, to groups across Tyne & Wear and Northumberland who are supporting vulnerable people affected by the Covid-19 crisis.
As we continue through the Government's roadmap out of lockdown in England, if you require support for your work now, you can make a general application which can be considered for any of our funds by going to our apply page.
We are also running a programme of targeted funding to support organisations working in priority communities to recover and renew their work in 2021. We will be in touch directly with organisations about this.
If you've any queries, you can call us on 0191 222 0945 or email us at general@communityfoundation.org.uk. More information is in the FAQs below.
Through the Coronavirus Response and Recovery Fund, we are supporting local charities and community organisations across Tyne & Wear and Northumberland. We have distributed nearly £2m to organisations supporting vulnerable groups affected by the COVID-19 outbreak. We are now working on targeted recovery funding for local charities and community organisations whose operations and finances have been affected .
The Community Foundation set up the Fund with an initial £200,000 contribution. Newcastle Building Society became a founding partner in the fund with a donation of £100,000. Virgin Money Foundation and the Sir James Knott Trust have also supported us with donations of £100,000 each. Information about other supporters who wish their details to be shared is below and on our JustGiving page.
If you are a business, funder or an individual that would prefer to give by BACS, please contact us at coronavirusfund@communityfoundation.org.uk and we will get back to you with the details you need.
For media queries about the Fund, please contact Adam Lopardo on al@communityfoundation.org.uk
As part of our commitment to openness and transparency you can find a full list of grants from our Coronavirus funds on 360 Giving's Covid Tracker which will be updated regularly. We will also include any Covid-19 related grants we make from other funds.
Below are quotes from some of our grantees about what difference grants from our coronavirus funds will make.
Grants from our Coronavirus funds are for charities and community organisations that meet our criteria for funding. If you require funding for Coronavirus relief and response activities, please visit the apply page to see if you are eligible - you can then make a general application at any time.
We are targeting the dedicated funds we have for Coronavirus recovery work, and have invited certain organisations to send us proposals. But any eligible organisation can make a general application to us to support recovery work. But please bear in mind the priorities we've set out below, and the type of size of grants we usually award.
If you require support, you can make a general application which can be considered for any of our funds by going to our apply page.
You may also be able to apply for help from other funders. Information about where to go for help with funding is here www.communityfoundation.org.uk/apply/help-and-support/
We understand the COVID-19 pandemic is continuing to have a big impact on individuals and families in our area. Our funds have been set up to support organisations that can help people most affected. We are not providing grants directly to individuals or families. If you are worried about your health or a loved one’s, please follow the advice at www.nhs.uk/conditions/coronavirus-covid-19/. If you are worried about money or other issues, you can contact a CAB www.citizensadvice.org.uk/ or other local advice centre www.adviceuk.org.uk/looking-for-advice/
Thank you for your generosity. Please email us at coronavirusfund@communityfoundation.org.uk and we will be in touch with the details of how to donate. If you wish, we will add your organisation’s name and logo to our list of supporters on this page. We’ll also give you material you can share with your staff and stakeholders about the fund and the organisations we support through it. If you would prefer to support the national appeal, you can find out how here.
To make sure we can run the funds as simply and effectively as we can, we can’t accept gifts restricted for a specific organisation. If you have a particular charity or community group you want to support, we encourage you to give to them directly.
If you wish to discuss setting up a named fund to support Coronavirus recovery work in a particular area, please get in touch with Lisa Cappleman or call us on 0191 222 0945.
Our focus with these funds is on getting financial support to charities and community organisations so they can respond to the virus and recover from its impact. We are not able to handle donations of goods or in-kind services ourselves. However, we encourage you to think about donating food to a local foodbank www.trusselltrust.org/get-help/find-a-foodbank/. You may also want to get involved with your local community response – www.covidmutualaid.org is a good place to start.
We appreciate the generosity of people who’d like to fundraise for us, but we do not want anyone running events or activities to raise funds which might go against current Government advice on social distancing. Instead, we encourage you to share information about our fund and how to make a donation via our Just Giving page.
The funds support charities and community organisations based and operating in Tyne & Wear (Newcastle, North Tyneside, South Tyneside, Gateshead and Sunderland) and Northumberland. If you want to support communities elsewhere in the UK or internationally, there is the National Emergencies Trust or the World Health Organisation appeal www.cafonline.org/home/covid-19-fund. You may wish to contact your local community foundation to see if there are similar funds in your area www.ukcommunityfoundations.org/our-network
The National Emergencies Trust has been running a UK-wide fundraising appeal. Some of the money raised has been allocated to us to award in grants in Tyne & Wear and Northumberland. We are running that alongside our own Coronavirus Response and Recovery Fund.
We make decisions weekly and publish updates regularly. Information is on this page, or you can see our grants (and those of other funders) on a dedicated site set up by 360 Giving.
The Foundation's own income has been affected by the economic impact of the Coronavirus outbreak. To make sure we can run the fund effectively and cover the necessary staff time, we are retaining 5% of the net amount of new gifts to our Coronavirus Response and Recovery Fund. That means if your gift is eligible, the cost contribution will in effect come from the Gift Aid we claim. In recognition of the scale of the crisis, this is significantly less than the contribution we normally retain from funds.
For the National Emergency Trust appeal, distributors are retaining up to 8% of funds to support costs.
