| • |
carried out a scoping study of community
concerns in interface areas; |
| • |
produced a number of reports and publications
including ‘Interface communities and the Peace
Process’, ‘Young people on the interface’,
‘Inner East/Outer West – addressing
conflict in two interface areas’, and submissions
especially with regard to the need for more effective
work with young people in interface areas; |
| • |
continued to help develop a single identity work
resource pack for young people/community activists
in interface areas. |
| • |
delivered a variety of inputs to a wide range
of constituencies – community, voluntary and
statutory; |
| • |
created and delivered a pilot ‘youth and
community work in an interface context’ half-module
as part of the Diploma in Combined Studies course
at the University of Ulster; |
| • |
acted as a referral agency, directing a large
number of inquiries from the media, students, researchers,
academics and the statutory sector, towards interface
community groups and projects for their first hand
experience; |
| • |
played an active role as a member of the Community
Dialogue management team.
|
| • |
gave a range of presentations to
different statutory agencies, often collaboratively
with key workers from interface community groups
and projects; |
| • |
took up membership of the Interagency Working
Group on Displaced Families – the group responsible
for resourcing the summer community mobile phone
network; |
| • |
was an active member of the Outer North Interface
Working Group. A sub-group of the Interagency Working
Group on Displaced Families, this interagency group
aimed over the long term to help to reduce tension
and violence in this area of north Belfast which
has been characterised, over recent years, by high
levels of violence and family-displacement; |
| • |
had an ongoing input into the work of the University
of Ulster’s ‘Mapping the Spaces of Fear’
research unit, and others, in researching the extent
to which local behaviour-patterns and opportunities
in interface areas are affected by perceptions of
fear associated with interfaces and with residential
segregation. |
| • |
influenced a number of agencies in reconsidering
their role in relation to interface areas, including
the Belfast European Partnership Board’s summer
interface funding-programme.
Supporting, through direct ‘honest broker’
facilitation, steps toward dialogue and collaboration
on issues of common benefit/concern. |
| • |
acted in a facilitative role in assisting
local groups in addressing issues relating to intercommunity
relations in a number of interface areas of Belfast
including Inner East Belfast (ie Short Strand and
its surrounding predominantly Protestant/unionist
population), Outer West Belfast (ie Suffolk and
its surrounding predominantly Catholic/nationalist
population), and also in some other areas including
the Greater Whitewell area of North Belfast; |
| • |
Supported a number of groups in interface areas
to make links and draw up collaborative programmes
of work with others; |
| • |
Actively supported the development of the Outreach
Youth Initiative in North Belfast |
