Cash for community groups with councillor grant scheme
Published 4 August 2026
A total of £270,000 is available to support community projects with this year’s round of the Councillor Community Grant Scheme from South Oxfordshire District Council.
The grant scheme launches on Monday 17 August and is open to non-profit organisations including community and voluntary groups and town and parish councils.
Previous projects that have been supported with this grant have ranged from mental health support groups for children, sporting equipment, memorial benches and solar panels for community buildings.
Cllr Georgina Heritage, Cabinet Member for Communities at South Oxfordshire District Council said: “Out of all the grants we offer this one is personal for our council members. We’re able to directly support organisations in our ward that we see make a difference to our communities every day.
“We give organisations plenty of time to get in touch with their ward member and discuss funding they need, but we would encourage them to get those emails or phone calls in early so that we can review the projects and funding being requested.”
Each district councillor is allocated £7,500 to award to projects and activities that offer community benefits in their ward area, budget permitting.
Organisations can apply for funding from £250 up to a maximum of £7,500 from their ward councillor or multiple councillors/wards should their project benefit a wider area or a ward where there are multiple council members and require a larger amount of funding.
In the 2024/25 round of the Councillor Community Grant Scheme the charity TRAIN was awarded funding to help plan and set up activities for young people in Didcot and Wallingford over the summer holidays.
Ben Drabble, CEO of TRAIN, said: “For a lot of our young people, summer can be a really isolating time. This programme meant they had something to look forward to and experiences they’ll remember. Some of them did things they’d never done before. We’re enormously grateful to our local councillors for their support.”
The Councillor Community Grant Scheme is one of six that is available for community organisations to apply for with South Oxfordshire District Council over this financial year. A total of £1,550,000 will be awarded to charities and local groups that support residents and benefit the local environment across the district.
The deadline for applications is midday Friday 4 December. More details about which groups are eligible and how to apply can be found on the South Oxfordshire District Council grants webpage.
Last year the grant went up from £5,000 per councillor to £7,500. The council received nearly 200 applications for funding and was able to award grants to 149 projects across the district.
