Advice on the (draft) Guidelines for the Welfare Grant 2026–2029

Administrative secretariat
PO Box 9033
7300 ES Apeldoorn

T: 06 2831 4935
E: adviesraadsociaaldomein@apeldoorn.nl

Date: 27 January 2025
Our reference: ASDA 2025-02

To: The Municipal Executive of Apeldoorn
CC: Marijke Eppink, Tim Lodder

Subject: Advice on the (draft) Guidelines for the Welfare Grant 2026–2029

Dear Council,

In accordance with your request, we are providing advice on the (draft) Guiding Principles for the Welfare Grant 2026–2029. In our advice, we follow the table of contents of the paper.

The first three chapters deal, amongst other things, with the general principles and funding. We endorse the decision to fund a number of activities through a budgetary grant. Section 1.5 identifies a number of points for consideration, to which we would like to add three themes:

• Sense of community: The Narrative Evaluation of Resident Support (Appendix 1) shows, amongst other things, that residents give an average score of 6 for the extent to which they can rely on others for support when needed without external assistance, and that the extent to which they look out for one another and offer a helping hand has been promoted to a limited extent by the support provided.
  It is recommended that greater attention be paid to strengthening relationships within neighbourhoods.

• Accessibility: The aforementioned evaluation also shows that residents have to go to considerable lengths to obtain the support they need.
  It is recommended that targeted publicity be used to lower the threshold for applying for the support required.

• Informal care: the subsidy scheme focuses entirely on professional care; informal care is hardly mentioned, if at all, even though it is a key factor in residents’ well-being.
  It is recommended that the desired collaboration between the professional and informal carers be explicitly stated in the guiding principles of the grant conditions.

The ‘Youth’ chapter examines how youth and young people’s work is supported and organised. We would like to highlight two issues here which may not be the focus of this paper, but which are very closely linked to this grant. Firstly, the Advisory Council draws attention to residents in certain neighbourhoods or situations who experience nuisance caused by young people but feel that their concerns are not, or hardly, being heard. A second point of attention, which may help to resolve the first issue, is the need for sufficient physical meeting places for young people and the youth workers present there.
It is recommended that the grant conditions take these themes into account.

In the field of community and social development work, the ABCD method is cited in various quarters as an important tool. It is noted, however, that experts have raised doubts about the effectiveness of this method.
It is recommended that the ABCD method be reviewed (once again) to assess its applicability and effectiveness in this context.

Under the specific guiding principles (section 5.3.), the section on ‘Deployment of professionals’ states that an annual review will be carried out of the additional deployment in certain neighbourhoods or districts, as these require extra attention.
It is recommended that extra attention be paid to these neighbourhoods by increasing the frequency of the assessments.

It is pleasing to note that the principles set out in section 5.3 are supported by the Vitality Agenda and the Neighbourhood Plan.

In the chapter on Neighbourhood Team Support, section 6.3 sets out the contributions to Samen 055. The advisory board considers these formulations to be very general
It is recommended that the stated objectives of Samen 055 be formulated in a more specific and concrete manner. 

The final chapter discusses Independent Client Support, which we wholeheartedly endorse. We would also like to emphasise the importance, as you mentioned, of raising awareness of this option for supporting applicants.

We would be happy to provide further clarification on the recommendations and comments we have made.

Kind regards,

Ewoud Remmelts
Chair of the Apeldoorn Social Services Advisory Board