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To award grants totalling £60,000 from
the Thriving Together Fund as follows:
 

Adur Voluntary Action &
Community Works for Communities Together: £15,00
Esteem for Our Voice, Our Community:
£10,000
Community People for On Your
Doorstep: £12,500
Worthing Festival for Worthing
Festival & Fringe 2026: growing our town together:
£12,500
Sight Support Worthing for Training
understanding & support for sight loss: £10,000

 
An overview of these projects is below.
 
Funding will be paid in March 2026 in line
with the requirement that all funding be awarded within the 2025/26
financial year
 

Reasons for the decision

The Thriving Together Fund forms part of the
wider Thriving Together programme, which supports community-led
action and neighbourhood collaboration across Adur and
Worthing.
 
The Fund was designed to:
 

Strengthen community cohesion
Build preventative, community-based
support
Reduce cost-of-living pressures
Grow collaboration and capability
within the local voluntary and community sector
 

The projects approved for funding were
assessed as those best able to:

Demonstrate meaningful collaboration
between groups
Deliver preventative and early help
activity
Reduce duplication and strengthen
joined-up local support
Provide value for money and
realistic delivery plans
Leave a practical legacy (e.g.
shared tools, training, approaches, or models) that other groups
can use or build on
 

The decision supports the Councils’
wider ambitions to build stronger, more connected
neighbourhoods.
 
The projects highlighted were assessed as
being the projects best able to build capability for local groups
while making the strongest positive impact on local communities and
leaving practical resources that others can use and benefit from,
and specifically those projects that best met the criteria
identified in the
Scoring Guide.
 
The Thriving Together Fund forms part of the
wider Thriving Together programme and was co-designed with local
groups in October 2025.
 
The Fund guidance and FAQs were published in
advance on
 

https://participate.adur-worthing.gov.uk/en-GB/projects/thriving-together 
 

Thriving Together Grant Fund Guidance
 

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
 
A total of 48 eligible applications were
received.
 
Applications were:
 

Assessed against a scoring framework
aligned to the Fund criteria
Scored independently by panel
members
Moderated and validated through
structured panel discussions

 
The assessment structure was:
 

Adur Panel – proposals
delivering activity in Adur
Worthing Panel – proposals
delivering activity in Worthing
Joint Adur & Worthing Panel
– cross-boundary proposals and validation of highest scoring
projects

Panel membership included relevant Cabinet
Members and Neighbourhood Leads as well as input into the Panel
from service leads (Wellbeing, Safer Communities and
Proactive).
 
Scores were based on:
 

Impact through collaboration
Contribution to cost of living,
cohesion and/or prevention
Strengthening of local groups and
shared capability
Deliverability and value for
money
Practical legacy (shared tools,
models, training or approaches others can reuse)
 

Given the fixed budget envelope of
£60,000, prioritisation was required. Funding the highest
scoring projects ensures the greatest collective impact within
available resources.
 

Alternative options considered

All 48 eligible applications were
assessed.
 
Several applications demonstrated merit;
however, the available funding did not allow all proposals to be
supported.
 
Alternative options would have included:

Funding a larger number of smaller
projects
Allocating funding evenly regardless
of score

 
These options were not pursued as they would
have reduced the impact that the Fund was designed to
achieve 
 
Feedback will be offered to unsuccessful
applicants and learning on the trends in terms of needs and
capability building all projects wanted to respond to will be used
to inform the Thriving Together Fund for 2026/27.