Overview of Funding

The funding landscape changes year on year, depending on Local Government contracts and successful grant applications for new projects. Such funding is always only partial and only secure for the short term.

So the balance must be made up from our own income generation and additional grant applications. The balance is kept under constant review but it is very challenging. Here’s a quick summary of how our activities are funded…

Welcoming Visitors to Mashamshire

We provide visitors to the area with face to face information and signposting.  Since 2004 we have developed and updated the visitmasham.com website to promote the area.  We also seek to raise the profile of Mashamshire via email news and our social media.

A contract with North Yorkshire Council is currently in place to support the provision of Visitor Information.

Supporting Our Local Businesses

We seek to support tourism and other local businesses via our website and other communication channels.  We ensure that the marketing and promotion of the area and in particular, helping raise the profile of our businesses, helps to support economic prosperity and enables our community to thrive.  We work with local businesses by organising Masham Business Connections to encourage mutual support and collaboration.

We receive no external funding for this activity.  Income from business advertising on our websites and printed Masham Directory, partially funds this important work.

Mashamshire Community Hub Activities

This means everything else we do!  It includes maintaining our building for the use of Acorns Pre-School and Masham Parish Council, recruiting and training volunteers to help us, helping residents to access services from North Yorkshire Council and coordinating all our community activities.

From face-to-face help, support and signposting, to Community e-Newsletters, help with shopping and prescriptions to providing access to the internet, organising wellbeing walks and minibus outings to maintaining the defibrillator… and much more.

When Masham’s library closed, we became one of the first community-run libraries in North Yorkshire.  We provide a home for the library and recruit and organise a team of passionate volunteers to run it.  North Yorkshire Council provide all the books and systems.

A contract with North Yorkshire Council is currently in place to enable us to help our community access Council Services, supporting us to be a “Community Anchor Organisation” and funding the use of our space as a Community Library.  We have applied successfully for additional grants to fund and build on this this work and we are grateful to the following funders:

• NYC – UK Shared Prosperity Fund for Decarbonisation & Capacity Building
• Nidd Plus NYC – Staying Healthy, Independent & Connected
• NYC – UK Shared Prosperity Fund – Digital Inclusion Hub
• NYC Locality Fund
• North Yorkshire Police
• National Lottery Community Fund
• Jack Brunton Charitable Trust
• Liz and Terry Bramall Foundation

More About Legal & Governance

Generating Vital Income for Ourselves

In order to be sustainable, we generate vital additional income for ourselves wherever we are able to.  Here are some of the ways we do this with the help of our volunteers:

• Box Office services for Masham Town Hall and other events venues.  We earn commission on ticket sales.
• Providing a booking service for Masham Town Hall and other local venues where we earn a management fee.
• Retail sales of maps and gifts in our MCO Shop.
• Commission on any sales from the Masham Flock Gallery.
• Income from jigsaws and second hand book sales.
• Service Level Agreements for subsidised use of room space by Acorns and Masham Parish Council.
• Service Level Agreement for providing support to North Yorkshire Police.
• Room Hire income

 

Shop to Support Us

Fundraising & Donations

Funding is never secure and the challenge to be sustainable is ongoing.  As costs increase and the demands placed on the voluntary sector are set to grow, we do not foresee a time when fundraising and donations will not be an essential ingredient in our blended income.

We are grateful for the ongoing support of Masham Parish Council, who make an annual donation to support our work. In addition, we thank the generous donations, legacies and fundraising efforts of individuals in our community.  They are needed more than ever, because we are doing more than ever.

Ways to Donate

The Story of Our Building Purchase

In 2022 we received the shocking news that North Yorkshire Police, our landlord of 20 years, wished to sell the Old Police House – our central Masham base for all our services and home to Acorns Pre-School, our Community Library, Flock Gallery and Masham Parish Council.

We were delighted to be given the chance to raise £215,000 with a very alarming deadline of August 2023. Fundraising plans began in earnest in June 2022 with a public meeting to come up with a strategy – plans came together under the badge of “MCO Forever”.

The MCO Forever local fundraisers came up with a programme of fundraising activities that included “Cow Pat Bingo” – an intriguing concept involving a guess as to the first cow to produce a cow pat… it got us on to national TV! In addition, we had financial or in kind donations from businesses and groups – see above, plus generous local individuals – we were so grateful. Jervaulx Hall generously donated all proceeds from their Open Gardens to our cause.

The final strand of activity was applications to grants and charitable trusts for help. Together, we did it! In just over a year our team and community raised £215,000.

Thanks to all our supporters, the purchase completed on 31st August 2023, securing our building as an asset for Mashamshire and a base to continue supporting our rural community long into the future.