LCDP Progress Report published; community groups await "alignment" proposals

Some of the 10,000 people who got a training boost through the LCDP in 2011

(1) This week Community Minister Phil Hogan is reportedly due to discuss his "alignment" proposals with Cabinet which could see local authorities gaining far more control over State-funded community and local development initiatives. 

He's had the summer to digest a final report by his expert group on "alignment" and he's expected to announce his proposals very soon. The Minister has found the going slow as he told 'Changing Ireland' shortly after being elected that he'd make his views on this matter public in July of last year. Therefore, anticipation has built among thousands of workers who are trying to second-guess what's in store for them and the communities they work with. The matter was debated in the Seanad last November.

(2) Separately, Pobal last Friday published the full final report showing some of the chief outcomes from work carried out under the Local and Community Development Programme. The initial findings were first reported in the summer edition of 'Changing Ireland'.

This new full report is 114 pages in length. We've highlighted a few tables from the report here. Let us know your thoughts/views on the report, or on alignment! Leave your comments on our Facebook page or email: editor@changingireland.ie

- ALLEN MEAGHER

Employment status of those who found work thru the LCDP in 2011.

The LCDP has four goals, one of the most important being to support people to find work or help them set up small enterprises and become self-employed. Best of all, the Programme targets its resources at those most on the margins. Here are the findings of national evaluation by Pobal of work nationwide last year in pursuit of this key Goal.

How many found work and where in 2011 through the Local and Community Development Programme (LCDP) in 2011? Pobal have the answers to this and many more questions in their just published progress report on the Programme.