The Accord Group of housing associations began a pilot enterprise scheme this month, to help new charities and community enterprises in the West Midlands get on their feet quickly by reducing some of the common barriers to successful operation.
The Tides Initiative is modelled on the US-based Tides, an umbrella organisation that provides funding and tailored support to up to 250 charities a year on governance, finance and administrative issues.
The Tides Initiative will mirror its US counterpart in its ‘fiscal sponsorship’ plan by providing restricted funding for charities admitted into the scheme. It will also allow new charities to register under its name for up to two years and provide in-house consultation on finance, IT, HR, marketing and auditing matters, thereby helping to reduce the amount of time charities spend on set-up.
The scheme also aims to benefit existing charities which will be offered access to the same support services independently, for a fee.
Accord also has a wider aim of creating employment opportunities for the housing charity’s 40,000 customers by aligning the projects created with tenants and creating service delivery, administrative and management jobs within successful projects. It is hoped that the scheme will also help to deliver the Big Society vision by allowing more new charities to take over public services.
Chris Handy, chief executive of the Accord Group said: “This radical new model will make it quicker, cheaper and more straightforward to establish new community-based enterprise.”
Handy stated that the expertise on offer is a key part of the scheme as charities often give up in the early stages of operation due to the burden of administration. He added that the built-in support of the scheme is especially pertinent for small charities which can no longer rely on funding from central and local government.
Founders
The running costs of the Tides Initiative will be funded by up to seven umbrella organisations including Accord, the Community Foundation Network, Manchester CVS, the Foundation for Social Improvement and the Claire Foundation.
The initiative, which aims to support 30 organisations in its first operating year, will also receive a cut of between 5 and 8 per cent of the annual income of participating charities. Accord is also seeking further funding for the scheme.
Handy said the scheme's two-year time frame was based on an estimation of when charities should be solvent and capable of managing projects to a sustainable end.
He added: “If an organisation isn’t working on its own within two years it probably won’t.” Charities will be expected to register with the Charity Commission after leaving the scheme.
Management and development structure
The Tides Initiative management board will initially be made up of representatives from each of the seven core partners, however Accord envisages that a specific team will eventually be put together to co-ordinate and promote the activities of the initiative.
Accord is in discussion with the Charity Commission to develop the scheme for charities across the UK and hopes to develop a kitemark to determine eligibility based on an assessment of how viable a prospective charity’s business plan is. It also intends to narrow its focus to five or six causes.
