Case Study 3

Project: Redcar and Cleveland Sport and Active Recreation Strategy

Client: Redcar and Cleveland Borough Council

Outline: Development of a Sport and Active Recreation Strategy for Cleveland Borough Council to guide the decisions, actions and investment by the Council and its partners in respect of sport and active recreation within the Borough for the next 5 to 10 years.

Our approach: We were involved with this project from the very early stages in terms of helping to define the scope of the Strategy. The remit was designed to be very broad, embracing a much wider range of recreation activities than traditionally tends to be reflected in local authority 'sports strategies'. This was because both the client and ourselves recognized that formal sport is played regularly by only a relatively small section of the community, and that if the Council's service was to be inclusive it needed to reach out to provide positive active recreational opportunities to many others.

We considered it essential to make the links between the Councils sports and recreational service, and other relevant themes and functions such as health, crime reduction, social inclusion, economic and community development.

Benefits: The Strategy has been very well received and has paved the way for a series of bids for external funding for major initiatives. It has also defined clearly the Council's service aims, objectives and priorities for the community it serves, and helped inform the Council's Best Value Service Review.