Vote for Greener Leith at Leith Decides

You can help us win some funding as part of the Leith Decides event that takes place this Saturday afternoon at Ocean Terminal at 1pm

We've applied for funding to run a campaign that we hope will help to cut the amount litter and dog fouling on the streets of Leith. Not only is this a priority in the local plan - it's also important because Leith is consistently one of the lowest scoring areas in the city for street cleanliness.

In total we've asked for £1000 to back this campaign. However, we are up against lot's of other projects and only those with the most votes will win cash.

Here's how we would use it:

£500 will enable us to cover catering and promotion costs. At our events we like to lay on some hot soup and rolls from Out of the Blue for the hard working volunteers who give up their time to help clean-up their local neighbourhood. This budget will also cover some printing and design costs for posters.

We plant to spend the other £500 putting together an online behaviour change campaign. It will be based around a series of short YouTube videos that will show people's reactions when we say thank you to them for picking up their dog poo or putting their litter in the bin. We intend to say thank you by giving people who do the right thing gift vouchers for local businesses.The £500 will be spent on production costs and match funding the vouchers that we will give away. 

It's likely we'll also match fund the campaign costs with our own funds, and we're also going to insist that local businesses contribute something too in return for a mention in the video clips. So if we win, it could help to unlock a wider community effort to tackle the litter problem.

The ideas is that the two aspects of the project will come together to help to create a feel good factor about looking after our neighbourhood. 

Whilst there's no doubt that sometimes people who drop litter and don't clear up after their dogs need to be fined to make them stop - that's not a power Greener Leith has - or wants!

So whilst we're happy to leave the council to be "The Stick" - we felt our role was to provide a "carrot" to encourage more people to do good in the 'hood.

If you think this is a good idea - then please do come to the Leith Decides event at Ocean Terminal Shopping Centre at 1.00 pm on Saturday, 25 February and give our project one of your votes.

We'd also love some help at our stall, as we need to persuade as many people as possible to vote for us! If you would like to volunteer on Saturday please do get in touch.

Comments

[Tommy fae Alford]

As a visitor to Leith, I'm delighted to read about your activities. Leith is great place, but it could be wonderful. It really feels like Greener Leith have got a the energy and the imagination to make people a little happier in their lives there, and lift everybody's expectations. I hope that you get the funding!