Cumbria CVS
Cumberland
Westmorland and Furness
Cumbria CVS is a registered charity and membership organisation. We help community/voluntary/not-for-profit groups and organisations to develop and improve by providing them with training and support services. These include one-to-one support, funding advice, bespoke training, business development, governance advice, and running regular training courses and networking events.
We help place people into volunteering roles throughout Cumbria, and work with groups that involve volunteers to follow best practice. In December 2011 we achieved Volunteer Centre Quality Accreditation from Volunteering England. This is a quality framework for Volunteer Centres in delivering six core functions of volunteering infrastructure at a local level: Volunteer brokerage; Marketing volunteering; Good practice development; Developing volunteering opportunities; Policy response and campaigning; Strategic development of volunteering.
We provide services throughout the county from our offices in Kendal, Barrow, Carlisle, Maryport and Penrith, where we:
- Provide bespoke and generic training to both organisations and volunteers
- Provide funding advice, updates and funding search services, including organising funding fairs and delivering fundraising training
- Advise and enable people to take up volunteering opportunities
- Run conferences and events and provide an events management service
- Provide payroll, bookkeeping, account preparation, independent examination of accounts, self assessment tax returns, corporation tax returns, limited company incorporation and company secretarial services
- Deliver projects and services e.g. Community Meals and the Inspiring Barrow community learning project
- Promote partnership work and enable groups and organisations to meet with service planners and commissioners
- Support organisations and groups to: set up new organisations; choose the right legal structure; register as a charity or Company Limited by Guarantee; draft constitutions or other governing documents; apply for funding and remain sustainable; write business plans; understand the roles and responsibilities of management committee members or trustees; develop suitable policies and procedures for staff and volunteers; work with other organisations to build links and develop partnerships or undertake mergers; trade and generate income; get ready for commissioning; address issues around employing staff; monitor and evaluate their work
- Provide representation and liaison services
- Undertake consultations and hold regular networking events
- Work in partnership with numerous organisations across the voluntary, local authority, health, education and commercial sectors e.g. delivering the Neighbourhood Care Independence Programme
- Works closely with, and support the Cumbria Third Sector Network and the Cumbria Infrastructure Partnership