ABOUT US

OUR MISSION

To carry out projects that achieve an economically, socially, and environmentally sustainable community.

STRUCTURE

Two community-based regeneration associations, the Camelford Town Forum and the Delabole Development Group provide the democratic basis for the Camelot Country CIC.

The Camelford Town Forum was started by local people following a serious water contamination incident in the late 1980s with the intention of providing a vehicle for local action on issues of social exclusion and deprivation.

The Delabole Development Group was set up by community representatives in 1999 to manage the outcomes from a community study. Its first task was to undertake a comprehensive questionnaire aimed at identifying key social, economic and environmental issues.

Locally, the two community-based regeneration groups are made up of representatives from parish and town councils, the chamber of commerce, the youth forum, the Camelford Town Trust, public representatives, the North & East Cornwall Primary Care Partnership, SureStart, local education facilities and a range of single interest groups such as the football club. This highly representative grouping works in partnership to bring broad, local credibility to a wide range of ideas and initiatives.

The body of information created by the two forums led them to join forces to create a development trust to implement and manage projects that would assist the community to overcome their identified problems.

The Memorandum and Articles of the Trust are based on charitable principles and the organisation’s community enterprise approach ensures all its activities benefit the community in line with its constitutional objects. The CDCDT was incorporated at Companies House as a Company Limited by Guarantee in June 2001.

PARTNERSHIP APPROACH

Camelot Country CIC also works in partnership with a range of regional and national organisations that have a complementary vision.

At a District level Camelot Country CIC has a partnership agreement with the North Cornwall District Council, two Integrated Area Plans established to develop Objective One projects and the Community Projects Trust.

At a county level, Camelot Country CIC is a partner of Go4 (the Information, Advice and Guidance Partnership that is a key element of the Government’s lifelong learning strategy and is affiliated to the Cornwall Development Trust Forum.

At a regional level Camelot Country CIC works in partnership with the South West Regional Development Agency, the Countryside Agency and other regional government bodies to deliver the Market & Coastal Towns Initiative.

Nationally, the Trust is a full member of the Development Trusts Association.
The years of experience accumulated by the Camelford Town Forum and the Delabole Development Group provide the direction for Camelot Country CIC. This includes a number of nascent projects and a significant amount of research has been carried out to determine and prioritise the projects required:
· The Camelford Economic Regeneration Feasibility Report (Jonathan Ball May 2000)
· An Economic, Social & Environmental Analysis of Delabole (Thorne, CPT, June 2000)
· Camelford Building Condition Survey (Pilkington 2000)
· The Community Questionnaire Survey (DDG, March 2001)
· The Electric Shuttle Bus Feasibility Study (G Barrett, October 2001)

The Trust took on the responsibility for facilitating the Market & Coastal Towns Initiative in the Area of Benefit in May 2002. The Trust has since taken on the role of accountable body for the MCTi and has managed a £25,000 grant to lead the process. In October 2002 Camelot Country CIC as CDCDT organised a comprehensive community consultation event, a Michaelmas Fair, that included a Planning for Real™ exercise as discussed in section 2. The event attracted over 800 participants and achieved a broader understanding regarding sustainable development within the community as well as an increased public profile for the Trust. The MCTi process and the consultation event have informed the development of a community strategic plan, currently being written by the Trust, that will be taken to a ‘brokering table’ of partner agencies and funding bodies before the end of 2003.

The beauty of the rural and isolated North Cornwall parishes of Camelford and Delabole belies the changes within and the external impacts on the area which have lead to social and economic exclusion and environmental pressures facing the community. The Camelford and Delabole Community Development Trust, a community led partnership, impacts positively and directly on the exclusion and decline of the area. Building on their own efforts, encouraged by the increase in funds available for regeneration in rural areas and the emphasis on “bottom-up” development, the community is taking steps to regenerate the area.

Camelot Country CIC works with the community to build a long-term vision of a sustainable community for the area. This is interpreted as a community that lives within its means by acknowledging its many assets, addressing its responsibilities and taking decisions for change determined by environmental, social and economic priorities. To achieve this visionCamelot Country CIC’s mission is to carry out projects that achieve an economically, socially, and environmentally sustainable community.

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