North Wales’ Police and Crime Commissioner has been to Gwynedd to learn more about how funding from the Your Community, Your Choice fund is being used to promote healthy initiatives for the people of the county.

Your Community, Your Choice is celebrating its 10th anniversary in 2023 and, over the past 10 years of over £500,000 has been awarded to more than 150 projects working to reduce crime in their areas and to support the priorities in the Police and Crime Commissioner’s Police and Crime Plan.

The Your Community, Your Choice fund supports grass-roots projects and is supported by Andy Dunbobbin, North Wales Police and Crime Commissioner, North Wales Police and Community Trust (PACT) and North Wales Police. The funding for Your Community, Your Choice comes partly from money seized by the courts through the Proceeds of Crime Act, with the rest from the Police and Crime Commissioner.

Following feedback from the Gwynedd community, leisure, sports and physical activity providers Byw’n Iach discovered local sports areas were considered expensive and inaccessible, leading to increased instances of antisocial behaviour amongst young people and lower levels of physical activity amongst local families.

To combat this, the organisation applied for Your Community, Your Choice funding to start a project to open the sports facilities across the 11 leisure centres in Gwynedd during school holidays.

Byw’n Iach was successful in its bid and has since used the funding to provide additional staff to monitor the facilities and purchase new sports equipment. The facilities offered as part of the project include 3G sports pitches, basketball courts, tennis courts and other outdoor recreational areas.

The amount received was match funded by Gwynedd Youth Service; who provided staff to run sessions at these facilities. So far in 2023, over 5,000 people have taken the opportunity to use the facilities.

Mr Dunbobbin met Amanda Davies, MD of Byw’n Iach and her colleague Ffion Williams, community sports officer. Amanda explained how the project works and how it has proved successful with the community and staff, giving people in the local area a way to keep active.

Mr Dunbobbin said: “I appreciate and respect the way in which Byw’n Iach have listened, and responded, to the community’s views.

“During the school holidays, children and young people can find it hard to find affordable ways to keep themselves occupied and I believe that Byw’n Iach’s project will help give young people worthwhile activities and in turn support my Police and Crime Plan of priority of supporting and engaging with communities.”

Alun Jones, partnership unit manager, Byw’n Iach, said: “We are extremely grateful to everyone who voted, which means we can now open our facilities outside for everyone to use during the holidays.”

To learn more about PACT, visit www.pactnorthwales.co.uk