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 East
Devon
Haringey
Sheffield
East Devon
East Devon is the second largest of the ten districts in the County
of Devon, with a population of 115,000. East Devon covers a wide
geographical area, ranging from the coastal resorts such as Exmouth
and Sidmouth to the largely rural hinterland which includes the
towns of Honiton and Ottery St Mary. The average population density
of East Devon is 1.5 persons per hectare. It is the rural character
of the area which led to its selection for inclusion in this research.
The volunteering infrastructure within East Devon is well established.
There is a Volunteer Bureau and a Council for Voluntary Service.
The local partnership organisation, working hand in hand with the
Institute to develop the research locally in East Devon is the East
Devon Volunteer Bureau.
Haringey
Haringey has been selected to represent an inner London borough.
Haringey is a multi-cultural community of 216,000 people in an area
of 11.5 square miles of North London. Large tracts of Haringey are
residential but the borough is rapidly developing as a hi-tech industrial
area. Haringey has enormous disparities in income, wealth, housing
conditions and unemployment. It is the ninth most deprived borough
in England. Almost half of the population comes from ethnic minorities,
and 9% is made up of refugees and asylum seekers.
The volunteering infrastructure in the borough has completed its
first phase of development and a volunteer bureau has been brought
into existence by Voluntary Action Haringey, the local Council for
Voluntary Service. The Bureau is now moving to its next stage which
will require the attraction of resources to enable its full operation.
This was one of the reasons for selecting the borough.
In Haringey, the partnership organisation helping to develop the
research will be Voluntary Action Haringey, they will be providing
invaluable local knowledge, experience and contacts.
Sheffield
Sheffield has been selected to represent an urban area in the north.
Sheffield is the fourth largest city in Britain, with a population
of over 500,000. In 1991 25,500 people in Sheffield (5.1% of the
population) were from Black and minority ethnic communities. (Sheffield
Unitary Development Plan, March 1998) After undergoing a
period of rapid industrial decline in the early 1980s, a number
of development initiatives are now active within the city boosting
the economy, employment and the environment.
The volunteering infrastructure within Sheffield is well developed.
The umbrella body ‘Voluntary Action Sheffield’, which has been in
existence since the 1950s, includes Volunteer Bureau and ‘Council
for Volunteer Service’ functions.
The Institute is working in partnership with Voluntary Action Sheffield
to design and implement the research locally, drawing on their extensive
networks of local contacts.
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