Joe O'Brien - Green Party
Green Party Minister O’Brien launches €1M fund for community development pilot projects
4th March, 2021
Green Party TD and Minister of State at the Department of Rural and Community Development, Joe O’Brien has launched an open call for proposals for Community Development Pilot Projects, with initial funding of €1 million in 2021. The development of community-led interventions to address social, economic, and environmental concerns has long been a policy goal of the Green Party and was a commitment in the Programme for Government.
Up to eight projects will be selected to be part of the pilot, with a focus on community development organisations working at local level to address issues including racism, violence, migration, gender, climate action and just transition.
Minister O’Brien said:
“Community Development is something the Green Party has campaigned on for many years and was a key commitment in the Programme for Government, so I’m delighted to have delivered on that commitment and to now have this pilot programme open for proposals.
“Community development is about trusting communities to create pathways out of poverty and inequalities based on their unique knowledge and understanding of the issues faced within the community. In the past, some State interventions were top-down approaches to addressing disadvantage. While well-intentioned, sometimes these approaches didn’t have the buy-in of the people they were trying to help and often suffered from lack of knowledge of the complexity of the issues on the ground. It’s important that these pilots are impactful and make a real difference as that can inform a potential growth of this community-led approach to the significant social challenges we are facing.
“At all times we want to facilitate a collaborative approach to building relationships and undertaking initiatives between marginalised groups, mainstream services and decision-making bodies.”
For more information please contact karen.power@oireachtas.ie