10 local villages set to share €1.5m in funding

A large crowd gathered in the Ardboyne Hotel, Navan, last Wednesday for the launch of Meath Partnership's new village enhancement initiative. 'Renaissance - Breathing Life into Rural Villages' is an opportunity for communities to design and implement a dynamic renewal programme for their local village and rural area. Michael Ludlow, Meath Partnership CEO, welcomed community and heritage groups, tidy town and pride of place committees, as well as local residents from all across Meath to the launch. "We are very excited about this project," he said. "It's a unique opportunity for communities to avail of expertise and significant funding to protect, celebrate and enhance the distinctiveness of their local village or town. Through our continuous engagement with communities across the county, we have seen that when people are empowered to participate in planning, the results are more effective." He added that Meath Partnership was dedicated to a 'bottom up' process of working and continued to support those local groups active in their communities. Meath Partnership is now calling for expressions of interests from community groups before 30th June deadline. "After this date, we will review all applications and select 10 villages to work with over the next six months to create an individual development plan for their area," said Mr Ludlow. "These successful villages will have the support of a team of specialist development, planning and landscape experts as well as the continued support of our Leader project officers at no cost. Furthermore, funding of up to €150,000 will be available to each village to implement their plans." He was keen to point out that significant Leader funding is available to community groups who are not successful under this call. Interested groups can access the expression of interest form plus terms and conditions by visiting www.meathpartnership.ie or by calling (046) 928 0790. Fordstown case study Fordstown is a small village located four miles outside Kells in north Meath. In 2005, a group of local residents set up the Fordstown Community Development Association and, since then, they have been very successful in accessing Leader funding to enhance the village. "A few of us got together to try and improve the area. It had become very run down and overgrown and just needed a bit of attention," said Stephanie Bray, chairperson. "We took things slowly at the start, entering the Litter League in the first year and we did quite well in that. We then entered the Pride of Place competition and were delighted to be awarded best new entrant for that year. I suppose that little bit of success gave us the confidence and encouragement we needed to keep going. Then, in 2006, we got ourselves together to apply for Leader funding to do a larger enhancement project in the village." She said Leader was a great help and the group was able to plant more flower beds around the area, restore a local monument and stone wall and put up a new heritage sign telling the history of the area. In the same year, Fordstown was asked to represent Meath in the All-Ireland Pride of Place competition. "Every year, we do a little extra and every year we do a little better; we won our category in the Pride of Place last year and the year before and the Leader funding has really helped us with that," she added. The benefits of the improvement to the village are obvious. "We would find now that we'd have a lot more people stopping in Fordstown admiring the village. One of the greatest attractions is the heritage sign where we have the story of the Moore brothers. They were born in Fordstown but emigrated to America back in the 1800s, where they became famous Hollywood film stars. "They even have their names on the 'Hollywood Walk of Fame' for their work in silent movies. That was something I had dug up myself through my own research; it hadn't been known before and now it's a prominent feature in our village," she said. In terms of accessing the Leader funding, Stephanie said: "I suppose, initially, it was very daunting with the paperwork. But once we got in there, it's not that hard. It's really just a matter of sitting down and doing it. Leader was very patient and they were a great support to us. They stuck with us and we stuck with them, so together we made a success of it!" The Fordstown group doesn't intend to rest on its laurels either. "At the minute, our big focus is on keeping it as good as it is. But we do have plans for future improvements. We want to extend the grass verges down the Athboy road another couple of hundred metres. We are also looking at getting some community lighting. We are always enhancing and maintaining to keep up our high standards," said Stephanie.