At its meeting on February 16, the Community and Safety Committee struck a number of problems. The first wasn’t so bad, having to wait for a quorum, but the next was. The purpose of Item 12 was to approve grants to regional community development organizations through the 2016/17 Regional Grants Scheme.
Officers assessed applications for ‘one off grants’ and put up their recommendations to the Committee. The Committee had no opportunity to workshop the applications ( which is what has, under my experience, as a former local board chair, happened with local board grants)
What surprised me is the report recommended the Committee grant money to organizations without any financial reporting or any project reporting as to numbers influenced, success of programmes/activities and the like.
Further to this, apart from Rape Crisis Auckland who applied for $13,000 and will receive $13,000, the 7 other organizations will not get the full amount they applied for. The organization however, has no idea which part of their application Council requires their money to be spent on.
I tried very hard to explain that by not being clear, we were not being transparent or accountable to ratepayers or the organizations
Incredulously I only managed to get half the committee to agree with me, and the vote was lost with chairs casting vote