Bridgend Association of Voluntary Organisations

BAVO is the umbrella organisation supporting and promoting voluntary organisations in Bridgend County Borough, South Wales, UK.

BAVO is a membership organisation with membership open to all voluntary and community groups working or based in Bridgend County Borough. We are a registered charity managed by an executive committee elected from our membership.

BAVO is the umbrella organisation for voluntary activity throughout the County of Bridgend, supporting, developing and representing voluntary organisations, volunteers and communities.

Are You:

Looking for information on voluntary services in Bridgend County?
A voluntary group seeking advice on available funding?
Thinking of starting a new group and need help with how to begin?
Have some spare time on your hands and would like to volunteer?
A community or voluntary group wishing to recruit volunteers?
Or perhaps you wish to expand your learning through informal training?

We can help you with all this, and MORE! To find out how, use the navigation menus to browse our site and click on the Contact Us button to get in touch.

For a copy of our latest Annual Report, please download from the Resources and Downloads section, or Contact Us.

Funding is received from

The Welsh Assembly through Wales Council for Voluntary Action (WCVA)
Bridgend County Borough Council (BCBC)
Bridgend Local Health Board (LHB).
The Big Lottery, for our Funding Development Team and advice service.

In addition to the money we receive to support voluntary groups, we also have responsibility for distributing grants to voluntary and community groups for a wide range of projects.

The 'community grants' we make are on behalf of the Welsh Assembly from money allocated to community regeneration.

Voluntary Sector Resource for Bridgend County

BAVO's head office was opened on 10th August 2007, over 100 people attended the event and visited the new Voluntary Sector Resource for the County based in Maesteg. The building was made possible through substantial funding from the Welsh Assembly Government's CFAP funding programme and the Big Lottery to whom we are very grateful.

We are also very grateful for the support of our Assembly Members Janice Gregory and Carwyn Jones and MP's Huw Irranca Davies and Wyn Griffiths who assisted the process during the funding application stage.

The building has rooms to let for groups who need their own base, it also has hot desking facilities that are free of charge for members to use. The hot desking room has about 7 desks all with computers and internet access, and you also have easy access to BAVOs other practical services such as photocopying.

There is also a 'community hub' space that is fully accessible on the ground level, self-contained and can be used day or evening, (it is not restricted to the hours that BAVO is open). There is a nominal charge to use this space, and it is suitable for meetings, training, service delivery / outreach sessions and even broadcasting! For more information contact Simon Wyatt on 01656 810400

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Online Forum

New Networking Opportunity - After having spoken with many of you about using different methods to engage you in debate we have decided to add a 'Forum' section to the website.

Here you can start a debate, or ask for advice or indeed share good practice amongst yourselves, the Forum space is interactive allowing you to talk to a range of people. Go and have a look and see what you think...