Four organisations providing help and support to Weymouth residents have been awarded nearly £10,000 in grants from Weymouth Town Council.

STEPS Club for Young People, Citizens Advice Central Dorset, Weymouth Museum, and Life Education Wessex and Thames Valley all had their applications approved at a recent Finance and Governance Committee meeting.

The four community organisations all received over £2,000 each to help fund projects aimed at promoting lifestyles, community engagement, emotional wellbeing and drug education as well as cost of living support.

STEPS will use the grant of £2,368 towards running a healthy lifestyle project for up to 70 young people. The pilot scheme will provide sports and activities, arts, and educational sessions on diet, online safety, mental health issues as well as valuable one to one support sessions.

£2,998 was awarded to Citizens Advice Central Dorset towards a six-month project looking at the cost of living crisis. The organisation will highlight help that is available to residents in the most deprived areas of Weymouth through face-to-face and online sessions. They will give people the tools to maximise their income, reduce their debts and seek help to reduce the impact of the crisis.

The £2,500 given to Weymouth Museum will help to extend their community engagement offerings - especially during school holiday periods - and the museum would also like to develop a regular dementia group.

Life Education Wessex and Thames Valley secured £2,115 towards the cost of providing its ‘Helping Children Make Healthy Choices’ programme. This will see educators providing health, emotional well-being, and drug education sessions to school children at St Nicholas & St Laurence, Wyke Regis Federation (Infants & Juniors) and Holy Trinity Primary.

Committee Chair Cllr David Gray said: “The grants awarded by Weymouth Town Council are designed to benefit a range of residents who need help and advice on a range of issues, including the current cost of living crisis.

"I would encourage other groups and organisations to get in touch with us if they would like the town council’s support with a particular project that will benefit the community.”