A key objective of our strategy to Create A City That Works For Everyone is to ensure that men and boys are included in work at grassroots level so we can tackle the Low Male Social Capital that exists in many communities and particularly the most deprived neighbourhoods. We refer to this work as being ‘hyper-local’.
The key objectives of our hyper-local work in the next three years are:
Year One (2011-2012): To identify one neighbourhood and deliver a year-long pilot project to tackle Low Male Social Capital at a hyper-local level and measure the impact and share the learning. The focus in our first year will be understanding how we embed and sustain interventions at grassroots level.
Year Two (2012-2013): To identify up to five neighbourhoods and deliver a second year-long project to tackle Low Male Social Capital at a hyper-local level building on what we learnt in year one – and measure the impact and share the learning. The focus in the second year will be understanding the most effective ways to take one hyper-local project to scale across several neighbourhoods at once.
Year Three (2013-14): We focus on how we make our work available and sustainable across every neighbourhood in the city with the intention of developing a model that is scalable to other towns and cities across the country and the world.
In all the work we do at a hyper-local level our intention will be not only to bring excellent services and interventions into the area but more importantly to create sustainable solutions by inspiring community-led innovation.
Glen Poole is UK co-ordinator for International Men's Day, Director at the consultancy Helping Men and news editor of insideMAN magazine. Follow him on twitter @HelpingMen or find out more about his work at www.helpingmen.co.uk.
Men's News From Brighton & Hove, England 
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