FALLING income, budget cuts and a move to a cheaper office have all had their impact on Dorset Community Action during the year.

But the organisation’s annual meeting in Dorchester on Friday heard, that despite the problems, it still managed to help more than three hundred groups, assisting them raise more than a £1million to benefit the community.

Treasurer Nick Warren told the meeting, at the Dorford Centre, Dorchester that unrestricted income was down £47,000 and there had been a drop in public sector funding for the organisation.

“With a future increasingly uncertain we have had to reduce our overheads,” he said.

Changes included a move to a new office at The Little Keep off Bridport Road and the loss of one member of staff.

Chief executive Alex Picot said that in the last two year Dorset Community Action’s income had halved – but despite that it still managed to attract people from 300 different groups to training sessions, almost 400 organisations received regular email bulletins and £1.1million had been raised by groups in the county with DCA support.

He spoke of the success of the ‘Living and Learning’ pilot projects in Weymouth, Portland, Beaminster, Wareham, Blandford and Ferndown and the contribution to the national debate about the loss of rural bank branches and ATMs.

Mr Picot said that the ‘Inspire Dorset’ project had secured more than half a million pounds of funding from the Big Lottery and the European Social Fund to use local coaches to help difficult to place people back into work and that a project in Bridport had looked at ways of re-investing in the local community.

“Our challenges will continue..but it’s fantastic that we have been able to deliver the services we do and it’s still a great place to work,” he said.

Chairman Alan Clevett spoke about the work which had been done to encourage closer working between the county’s Third Sector and the new Dorset Council – describing the two meetings held since April with shadow council leader Cllr Rebecca Knox as ‘incredibly positive.’

Shadow cabinet member and briefholder for social care Cllr Jill Haynes told the meeting that the new council welcomed partnership working and said that she hoped the new council would bring with it a new culture – with ‘bottom up’ rather than ‘top down’ initiatives.

She said the new council needed to have less tiers of management and operate more efficiently if it was to achieve the savings promised – but was starting life with a predicted £15.4million shortfall in its budget and spending commitments of £1milllion a day.