Back in February we applied to the Ventnor Town Council (VTC) for a grant towards a new project which we hope will be of great benefit to Ventnor town.
We are in the process of creating a new online visitors guide to Ventnor, highlighting everything a visitor to the town might need to know. It’ll be a comprehensive guide to accommodation, restaurants, services, events, etc.- with visitors comments and reviews.
The outline budget for the project is quite considerable, so when an advertisement calling for people to apply for grants from the VTC came up, we thought we’d apply for £1,000 as a contribution to the large set up costs.
Obviously, many people apply for these grants, others in the same round included the Rugby Club, Invent Theatre, Ventnor Together, Ventbag and the Ventnor Enhancement Fund.
Conditions
We understood that there was a total of £5,000 available, but that this had to be divided between all those applying, so we weren’t surprised when instead of the £1,000 applied for, £500 was offered and we were grateful for the gesture from the Town Council.
Unfortunately, what came attached to the pledge for £500, was a condition that none of the other grants awarded were subject to.
According to the report in the SW Chronicle, subsequent to the amount being agreed by the committee, the chair of the Grants Committee, Rob Mew, later decided that the money would only be awarded if we were able to match fund it.
We were a little surprised to see this condition attached to our application but none of the others, so we phoned Cllr Mew for find out why.
Despite our best attempts to try and ask a few questions, what followed was a 20-minute telephone ‘conversation’ we were constantly talked over, not listened to and then fobbed off with something along the lines of ‘how do we know you’re going to use it for what you say?’
Untrustworthy?
The insinuation, despite freely giving two and half years of our time to provide VentnorBlog to the community, was that we were potentially untrustworthy.
Understandably, we taken aback by this attitude, so after much consideration, we decided, on principle, to not take up the grant offer.
We wrote to Grants Committee last week to inform them of our decision, and hope that the money can be awarded to another worthy cause.
Just as a side point, because you know we’re sticklers for detail. The grant pledge was mis-reported as going to VentnorBlog. The money wasn’t intended for VentnorBlog at all, but for the new project for which the Grants Committee had received a three page report on.
Many will say we’re stupid and should’ve taken the money, but …
Principle is an important thing to us.
Image: Eddy Grant by PCW
