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12 September 2008

Minutes of the meeting of the Community Initiatives Committee of CRC on Friday 12th September at CRC, Belfast.

Present:  Maura Muldoon (Chair), Michael Wardlow, David Stevens, Libby Keys.

Staff:  Jacqueline Irwin, Paul Jordan, Alison Keenan, Andrew Smyth, Judith Hamilton, Patricia Cuthel (minute taker)

Apologies:  Hazel Francey, Stella McDermott, Eileen Gallagher, Duncan Morrow

1.  Minutes of Previous meeting :  Approved

2.  Matters Arising:  None

3.  Programme Updates                                                    Paper CIC 120908/002 refers

Mrs Keenan advised members that she was in the process of catching up with the work of the programme and preparing for the coming period

Mr Jordan advised members that the CR/CD programme is very bust with applications coming in.  He also advised members of difficulties arising from a grant awarded to and subsequently withdrawn from Stoneyford Jubilee Committee.

4.  Management of In-Contract Savings.                      Paper CIC 120908/003 refers

Members agreed the proposal contained in the paper and Mrs Keenan is to follow up with CRU

5.  Continuation Funding 2009/2010                             Paper CIC 120908/004 refers

Members agreed to the proposal contained in the paper

6.  Extension to Existing Contracts                               Paper CIC 120908/005 refers

Members agreed to implementation of the proposal as per option 4 of the paper

7.  Applications and Assessments for 2009    Paper CIC 120908/006A & 006B refer

Members agreed to implementation of the proposed changes subject to:

·     Mrs Keenan “road-testing” the new pro-formas to ensure they work

·     Confirmation that Human Rights is considered a charitable activity under new charities legislation

·     Inclusion of a question in the application as to any other funding applications made including those which have been declined

·     Re configuration of the sustainability question to focus less on the Lederach model and more on sustainability generally

8.  Evaluation Programme                                               Paper CIC 120908/007 refers

Ms Irwin advised that Damien is with CRC less than 1 year and that he has 3 areas of responsibility.

1.     To carry out evaluations.

2.     To look at CRCs own evaluation procedures.

3.     On a general level – what are we learning from evaluation work?

Committee thanked Damien for all his work in this area.

9.  Evaluation issues                                           Paper CIC 120908/008 refers

The content of this paper raised a number of issues which were discussed including:

·     That groups feel if they have a good evaluation this will guarantee future funding.

·     There is a role for the information from evaluations in funding decisions

·     That evaluations can be confusing to funding decisions as they may be contradictory.

·     The dual function of evaluation: audit and learning and how these combine will be challenging for CRC

·     The need to discuss and define Core Funding – What does Core actually mean.

Staff were asked to develop a proposal to bring forward to committee.

10.  Any other business:  none

Date of next meeting: 11 December 2009 in Belfast 10am-1pm (time to be agreed)