THE prestigious 2017 SURF Awards for Best Practice in Community Regeneration were launched yesterday at a Heritage Lottery Fund Scotland event celebrating the Year of History, Heritage and Archaeology.
SURF, a regeneration forum with 250 cross-sector member organisations across Scotland, runs the annual awards in partnership with the Scottish Government. It highlights and celebrates the achievements of initiatives that address physical, social and economic challenges in communities across Scotland.
SURF’s chief executive Andy Milne said that the links between “heritage, places, communities and regeneration” have featured prominently at the awards over recent years.
“The very productive links between heritage, places, communities and regeneration, have featured prominently in the SURF Awards over recent years. So it’s highly appropriate for us to be launching our 2017 SURF Awards process in collaboration with HLF, especially in this designated year of History, Heritage and Archaeology”
This year’s five thematic categories include; Creative Regeneration sponsored by Creative Scotland, Youth Employability: Overcoming Barriers sponsored by Skills Development Scotland, Community Led Regeneration sponsored by Highlands and Island Enterprise, Scotland’s Most Improved Place sponsored by Scotland’s Towns Partnership and Architecture & Design Scotland and finally introducing a new Housing category for 2017.
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