Community Networks

Profile of Inner City Local and Community Development Projects

The principal aim of the DICP is to improve the quality of life and secure the rights of income poor inner city residents, through increased access to quality education and employment opportunities and by increasing public and private investment in disadvantaged areas.

The Partnership operates to a six-year strategic plan which is primarily aimed at achieving social and economic rights for inner city residents.

The DICP approach provides a strategic framework for sustainable community regeneration with an emphasis on partnership and community-based responses. The Partnership invests in a community infrastructure to operate a catalyst and brokering role to support a more coordinated and collaborative approach to the delivery of public services, stimulation of local economic development and the collective influence to lever inward investment to our targeted areas, groups and individuals.

The stated objectives of the NICDTF are to:

• Remove the chaos of problem drug use through immediate treatment interventions
• Understand problem drug use as a result of social, economic and political circumstances.

The NIC Drugs Task Force has developed a programme for action which has provided a balance between treatment, rehabilitation, prevention, education and enforcement measures. A networked community development and equality approach remains central to the strategy. Such an approach demands that the strategy is inclusive of the community, including drug users and their families.

South Inner City Drugs Task Force

In line with the Government's drugs policy the aim of the Task Force is to provide an integrated response to the problems posed by drug misuse.The key objectives of the SICDTF include:

• Reducing the number of people turning to drugs in the first instance through comprehensive education and prevention programmes
• Supporting measures aimed at reducing the harm to those actively using drugs
• Providing appropriate treatment, rehabilitation and aftercare for those who are dependent on drugs
• Having appropriate mechanisms in place aimed at reducing the supply of illicit drugs
• Ensuring that an appropriate level of accurate and timely information is available to inform the response to the drug problem
• Supporting families and communities affected by drug use

RAPID Programme

RAPID operates in designated areas in the four quadrants of the inner city and delivered through Area Implementation Teams involving community, statutory and local development representatives, the RAPID programme is designed to target investment to the most acute areas of disadvantage through planning the better co-ordination of services and investment to meet local needs. The programme should facilitate a bottom up identification of needs with a top-down delivery of services through the front loading of budgets available under the National Development Plan. The delivery of the programme involves.

• Operating within existing structures to avoid wasteful duplication of activity and effort
• Complementing the range of initiatives and programmes already in existence
• Involving flexibility to take account of the characteristics of individual RAPID areas

Community Technical Aid

Community Technical Aid provides technical support to local disadvantaged communities and projects including carrying out contract development work for statutory, community and partnership organisations.The services and support CTA provides include:

• Social Research / Evaluation
• Urban Planning
• Training / Project Management

CTA has a specific programme called Technical Support to Struggling Communities which complements area-based local and community development initiatives and enables struggling communities to benefit from rapid urban change. This technical support includes training, facilitation, research, planning and policy work.

last updated: May 02, 2006

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