Community Chest Grants

Community Chest is a grant programme which ran twice in 2023. It funds small- to medium-sized community groups to offer ‘social prescribing’ types of services and activities. This is with the aim of supporting the health and wellbeing of Waltham Forest residents.

We work closely with the Waltham Forest Place-Based Partnership, a partnership of health, care, community, and voluntary sector organisations. The partnership delivers activities and services for residents around specific needs. These needs are directly linked to health inequalities identified across the borough.

Any constituted voluntary, community, or recreational group working within Waltham Forest were able to bid for up to £9,999 to deliver projects addressing one or more of the programme priorities:

• cost of living emergency;
• mental wellbeing and loneliness;
• digital exclusion;
• learning disabilities; and
• increasing community access to health services and health information.

The panel, made up of representatives from health, council, voluntary and community sector, awarded nearly £130,000 over two rounds to 23 projects in total. 

You can read more about some of the projects funded so far at the links below:

• 12 new 'social prescribing' initiatives from Community Chest 2023 funding
• Promoting Health Equality in the African and Caribbean Community
• Discover the organisations passing “Go” with our Community Chest Grant funding

The programme will re-open for applications later in 2024 with a date to be confirmed.

If you have any questions get in touch with the Social Prescribing team at social.prescribing@walthamforest.gov.uk

If you are a community group interested in applying you can get further details on the programme, as well as further funding opportunities, including getting regular updates to your mailbox by registering with  Waltham Forest VCS Funding Portal.