Formed in 2013, the Northern Allotment, Leisure and Community Gardens (NALCG) is a Charitable Incorporated Organisation (CIO), Charity number 1155968.
The Charity, as originally set up, was for a single community garden on an allotment site in Sunderland. This was to provide advice, mentoring on creating a community garden and provide support finding volunteering and funding resources. We also aided in Risk Assessment, Health and Safety issues, Safeguarding and Publicity. The finished garden was hailed as an example of what other allotment sites could achieve.
Due to demand, we expanded our coverage to the whole of Northern England. We cover the area from the Scottish Border down to the Yorkshire Border and from the East to the West Coasts.
Since our first garden, we have now completed three more and are embarking on another three during 2021. We have helped and consulted with over 10 community gardens in the last five years.
The NALCGs objective is to:
Provide consultancy and advice on governance, health and safety, volunteering, horticulture, environmental considerations, accessibility requirements, risk assessment, funding and general advice on starting and running Community and Leisure Gardens. We will also advise on how to get volunteers involved in the creation of the gardens but also ongoing support.