Grants to Advance Roma Rights & Integration

Deadline: 19 March 2013
Open to: NGOs registered in Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, the Czech Republic, France, Hungary, Italy, Kosovo, Macedonia, Montenegro, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, and Spain
Grant: no restrictions as to the amount of support for a given project – USD $2 million total is allocated for the projects

Description

The Roma Initiatives Office invites interested nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) to apply for funding to advance the rights and integration of Roma.

More than two decades after the start of the transition to democratic institutions and market economies in Central and Eastern Europe, there is a consensus that there has been no major breakthrough in achieving the integration of Roma. The current advocacy approaches and capacities of Roma organizations and citizens groups have had limited results. This is compounded by a lack of renewed vision, weakened civic activism, brain drain, and little or no public recognition of the critical voices of Roma.

At the same time, there is also cause for hope. The situation of Roma is more visible than ever. There is no longer any doubt that it presents the major human rights challenge for Europe today. Also, among Roma civil society, there is a critical awareness of the need to move forward in a new way. Roma civil society has started identifying the major challenges and lessons learned from the previous twenty years.

Purpose and Priorities

The purpose of this call is to support responses to the challenges faced by Europe’s Roma and to strengthen the foundations of hope. It focuses on organized advocacy for changing the policies, regulations and practices that perpetuate the exclusion of Roma. To realize such change, projects should generate strategic capacity among Roma NGOs, organizations from the broader civil society and grassroots constituencies. This may mean changing or advancing a new policy, or ensuring enforcement of an existing one.Potential applicants should focus on one or more of the following priority policy areas:

Elections, with a focus on voter protection
Ending anti-Gypsyism and discrimination
Transparency and accountability of public spending on Roma integration
Rights of Roma women
The right of Roma to adequate housing
Employment and income generation for Roma
Rights of migrants including internally displaced persons (IDPs), refugees, returnees, asylum seekers and migrants of Roma origin

Applicants will be encouraged to consider using a wide range of advocacy methods and tools, such as: voter empowerment, coalition building, community organizing, litigation and legal advocacy, traditional and social media, research and policy analysis, the use of existing demonstration or pilot projects, and the use of arts, culture and sports as platforms for constituency building.

Approved projects are expected to start no earlier than July 2013.

Budget Amounts and Contributions

The current call has no restrictions as to the amount of support for a given project. In the concept paper, applicants should provide a minimum and a maximum budget estimate for completing the project. Overhead (administrative) costs should not exceed 10% of a project budget.

In the context of the current call, Roma NGOs participating in a project, either as a lead organization or a partner, may also request support for institutional development purposes. A “Roma NGO” is defined as an organization in which at least 50% of the membership (in the case of associations), governance body and senior management openly declare their Roma ethnic origin. Separate guidelines and an application form will be provided to Roma NGOs expressing interest, and whose concept paper has been invited to submit a full application.

The total budget available for supporting proposals in this call is 2,000,000 USD. All projects are expected to have an own contribution of minimum 10%. This can be through in-kind resources (e.g. meeting spaces, volunteer time), donated goods and services, and financial contributions from funders other than the Open Society Foundations. Projects showing financial contributions from other sources, beyond the 10% minimum requirement, will be assessed more positively in the budget-related criteria.

Eligibility

NGOs registered in the following countries are eligible to apply: Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, the Czech Republic, France, Hungary, Italy, Kosovo, Macedonia, Montenegro, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, and Spain. While the organizers wish to support quality projects in all eligible countries, the Roma Initiatives Office plans to allocate the majority of its resources for this call in its current focus countries: Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Macedonia, Romania, Serbia, and Slovakia.

Application

Interested organizations should first consult the application guidelines HERE which include: an overview of the main challenges and sources of hope framing this call; key policy areas; main methods and tactics; targets and constituencies; budget amounts and contributions, and assessment criteria.Interested organizations should submit a concept paper using the attached template.

Concept papers must be submitted online HERE. You can find a template for the concept papers HERE. Only organizations whose concept papers are approved during the first stage of pre-selection will be invited to submit full proposals. An invitation to submit a full proposal does not mean that the project is approved for funding.

If you encounter problems during the application process, please contact roma@opensocietyfoundations.org. For more information, read the official call for concept papers HERE or see the official website HERE.

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Grants to Advance Roma Rights & Integration

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Application

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