Apply for a community grant

We anticipate a 6-week turnaround from when grant rounds close and when we will notify you of the outcome of your application. We expect your project or event to be delivered the following quarter.

If your project falls over multiple quarters, we expect you to start delivering it by the following quarter after you receive your funds. For example, if you apply on 1 July for a $10,000 grant, it will start to be assessed after 31 July and we will aim to notify you of the outcome by mid-September. We would then expect the project or event to be delivered by 31 December (or started by this date if the project falls over multiple quarters).

Yes, you can use part of your grant to cover traffic management.

Traffic management plans will need to be submitted as part of the event approval process. Council does not provide event traffic management as part of our services.

Community grants cannot be used for building projects, capital works or facility maintenance.

Anything that is not yearly or part of your core or usual business would be considered a regular event.

A media pack is being designed by the Communications Team. Notification about your acknowledgement level will be provided in your Conditions of Grants form.

If your organisation is registered for GST it will be paid on top of the grant amount. If it is not registered for GST, it will not be included.

You can add additional contacts if you are partnering with another organisation so that people at the other organisation can enquire about or take actions on the grant.

An example of in-kind contributions can be staff or volunteer hours, venue hire, or donated goods and services, funding received from other bodies – must not be double dipping and this will need to be demonstrated.

Volunteer hours are calculated at $42 per hour for in-kind contributions.

At this stage there is no waiver process for grant recipients hiring Council venues. Incorporating this will be considered in the future.

Not at this stage. Upon application, you were approved for the event to be run in the City of Whittlesea.

We may consider out of area venues in the future. 

All staff, volunteers, contractors or consultants are required to declare their conflict of interest when applying for grants.

There are a few levels to conflict of interest:

• Actual conflict of interest (e.g. the person applying for the grant is a staff member, volunteer, contractor or consultant with City of Whittlesea).
• Potential conflict of interest (e.g. someone on the team works with Council but they’re not the person applying for the grant).
• Perceived conflict of interest (e.g. a third party may perceive a conflict of interest by your involvement both in the group and with Council). 

If in doubt, please err on the side of caution or contact the Grants team if you need more assistance on 03 9217 2170.

Grants assessors will be from a range of teams across Council.

Assessors will consult with subject matter experts in the field before finalising their assessments.

Grants are open all year around and will not close. The dates provided are the dates that the assessment process will begin.

It is highly unlikely that the grants budget will be used up in the first quarter.

The grants budget at Council has been increased by 33% and all applications over $3,000 will be approved by a group of senior leadership and executives.

There will be no direct feedback for acquittals unless it is requested.

Project or event outcomes will be summarised, collated and reported to Council with others in the same quarter.

Aside from State Government regulations, fundraising permits do not need to be obtained except for collections on public land (e.g. highway collections).

Further information on fundraising permits

You can apply for an Australian Business Number (ABN) online.

Visit the Australian Business Registry to apply for your ABN.

The auspice letter should include:

• auspice organisation name and ABN
• applicant name
• grant type
• project or event name
• grant amount applied for
• be signed by the correct delegate in the auspice organisation. 

Download an auspice letter template(DOCX, 21KB)

Grants are assessed by: 

• adherence to City of Whittlesea's 2040 goals
• target audience
• not being previously funded
• areas of lower socio-economic indexes (SEIFA)
• budget.

Read more about the Whittlesea 2040 goals.

If you have an event in December you would want to apply for the grant for your project or event in Q2. Once the quarter is closed, it will go through the assessment process and you will be notified on the outcome within about 6 weeks. You would then hold the event by the end of December and acquit the grant the following quarter.