About us
Our servicesCommunity First Oxfordshire is a community development and placemaking charity
We support Oxfordshire’s people and places to work together and thrive. We work closely with many different stakeholders from Local Authorities and Councils to Community Groups and Charities to NHS bodies and Developers. We offer different forms of support, including:
Our Strategy
We’ve identified four key strategic themes to guide us through 2026-9.
Community Infrastructure
Communities are supported to deliver projects and activities that help shape their local area by meeting locally-identified needs.
Health and Wellbeing
Communities are supported to improve general health and wellbeing of their community members
Truly Affordable Housing
Truly affordable housing is permanently and widely available in communities
Climate and Nature
Communities are supported and energised to positively respond to the climate and ecological crises
Community Development Principles
Community development is a process where people come together on a shared focus and act together to improve quality of life for all. Community First Oxfordshire is rooted in the art of community development, working with communities of place and identity to work together on the things that matter to them. Throughout our work, we are guided by our community development core principles.
Read our Community Development Principles (To be added soon)
Placemaking Charter
Placemaking is a collaborative process where communities help create quality places to live, work, play and learn in. Using the community’s knowledge, skills, and lived experience, good placemaking approaches balance the current and future needs of a community, and looks beyond roads, power and water to social infrastructure—public spaces, facilities, transport, local services and green spaces. Our Placemaking Charter details our vision for placemaking and how to achieve it.
Read our Placemaking CharterWe use and advocate for the model of ABCD – Asset Based Community Development. ABCD recognises, identifies and harnesses existing ‘assets’ (i.e. things like skills, knowledge, capacity, resources, experience or enthusiasm) to strengthen community resilience.
Our Values
Equality, equity, diversity, and inclusion
We want to genuinely connect and work with all people from all backgrounds who live in a place, a community. We recognise that we do not all start from the same place and need to make adjustments for inequities to create a fairer society. We value the benefits of different perspectives, backgrounds, and experiences, identifying under-representation and taking active steps to address it.
We make every effort to create welcoming spaces for all, improving accessibility and enabling diversity. We have developed an EDI (Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion) and Equal Opportunities Policy and an EDI Action Plan to hold ourselves accountable to our values and allow for an ongoing appraisal.
Our EDI PolicyIntegrity
To help ground us, we go back to our local knowledge and research with community members to make sure we are doing the right thing at the right time. We must be trusted to keep our word.
Accountable
We ensure that we carry out our work with honesty and transparency. We are accountable to our members, funders and to each community we work with.
Adaptable
We are always open to change and to adapt, whether that’s making changes within our own organisation or with others. To lead by example and be adaptable to change is a very important value for CFO. We engage with and listen to the needs of diverse individuals and communities. We advocate and support and help put into place what our communities are telling us.
Our Partners
We collaborate with a variety of partners and stakeholders to deliver our work:
Our History
Co-founded by Grace Hadow OBE in 1920, Community First Oxfordshire initially focused on providing art and literature to rural places, advocating for new public libraries and community halls in rural Oxfordshire.
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