THE Forest is set to receive £40,000 of a pot of £3.2million of National Lottery funding.

Katie Clark, communications officer for the South West, described the projects being funded locally as “really lovely community projects.”

There were 214 grants awarded across the region. The four in the Forest of Dean are going to Redbrook Village Hall, Forest of Dean Children’s Opportunity Centre, Clearwell Church of England Primary School and Ruardean Woodside District Memorial Hall.

Katie said: “The Forest of Dean will receive £40,000 for four really lovely community projects. The money, raised by players for good causes, is being distributed by the Big Lottery Fund, the largest funder of community activity in the UK. In total, four community projects in the district are receiving a share.

“Funding will support projects ranging from a village hall kitchen refurbishment to a play scheme for pre-school children with additional needs 

“Redbrook Village Hall is one of the projects involved – it will be receiving £10,000. The funding will be used to replace the air conditioning system, making the maintenance of the venue more sustainable in the long term, as well as improving the facility for community events and activities.”

Jim Dunn, Trustee at Redbrook Village Hall, said: “With the help of The Big Lottery Fund we had already installed a new floor that bounced enough for ballet classes, as well as the jive. It has kept a spring in the step of Redbrook and now we have been given a grant to circulate air in the hall to prevent condensation. We are looking forward to dancing without blaming the sweating on condensation.

“Thank you to the National Lottery players; you have helped us to dance and enjoy a wonderful village hall.”

The Children’s Opportunity Centre will receive just under £10,000 to run a play scheme for pre-school children with additional needs.

Manager, Marilyn Smith, said: “The grant will allow us to provide play schemes for children up to five years of age with or without a special need or disability within the Forest of Dean and children up to seven who have a special need or disability.

“Between 58 and 100 children and families will benefit from this service each year, depending on the number of referrals made and on funding to allow us to run fully staffed”.

Clearwell Primary, will have just under £10,000 to install a new sports and play area for use by children and local community groups, and the hall in Ruardean Woodside is receiving £10,000 to refurbish the kitchen facility at the community hall.

Katie added: “Although we report on these numbers every three months, our Awards for All and Reaching Communities programmes are open for applications on a rolling basis.

“In total we received 35 applications from the Forest of Dean last year. Of those, 22 received funding (a 63 per cent success rate), and 13 applications were unsuccessful (a 37 per cent failure rate). This compares favourably with the average England success rate as follows: 56 per cent successful, 44 per cent unsuccessful.

“The total amount funded in each area in each announcement changes dependent on the number of applications we receive from projects in the area. For example if more projects in the Forest of Dean apply for funding, it’s highly likely there would be a higher number of funded projects.”

You can search for funded projects in any given area on the Big Lottery Fund website.

To apply for funding, visit www.biglotteryfund.org.uk/funding