Housing
The social housing sector has had a longer history of community engagement around budgets than any other part of the 'public' sector. And some housing associations have used PB to take their engagement to the next level.
Over the past few years, there has been a steady take up of PB amongst housing associations and ALMOs, although the numbers are still fairly low. There is significant potential for innovation in developing PB in this sector.
Given that tenants will now be responsible for paying rent directly, involving them in decisions about their homes and estates is even more important - PB is ideal in making the connections between rent paid and quality of service on estates, and encouraging regular rent payments.
The most common budgets used by Housing Associations for PB are environment budgets. Housing Associations have taken different approaches with some using the budget as a community grants pot and others using PB to direct more core spend on environmental projects.
At Cartrefi Conwy which operates across Conwy County in North Wales, they adopted an 20/80 model. They used 20% of the budget for a community grants project, but incorporated community priority setting into the process. The priorities and the voting process both informed how the remaining 80% of the environmental budget was spent on more core service provision in this area, enabling tenants to see a greater link between the impact of their decisions and what's delivered on their estates.
Get involved with The People's Budget!
Choose Health in Deptford
PB masterclass: commissioning and budget cycles
