DHR Communications

August is meant to be a relatively quiet month for PR and public affairs, but DHR Communications has been busy working on a number of client projects.  This week alone, we’ve had the launch of Active Retirement Ireland’s new website, www.activeirl.ie, with Eamon Ryan TD, Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources, and the publication of a report by Comhar Sustainable Development Council on how Ireland can enhance and develop its green infrastructure.

We also spent all day yesterday in Limerick, delivering the first day of a three-day training programme to representatives of the New Communities Partnership.  The training focuses on building the media and advocacy skills of new community leaders, and follows on from the successful delivery of a similar training programme with participants in Dublin.  We also delivered media training to Threshold last week.

Our work on the WebActivate project, meanwhile – which is supported by The Digital Hub – is ongoing: the project is currently focused on signing up small to medium-sized enterprises that would like to get their websites improved or even built from scatch, free of charge.

And in recent weeks, we’ve also worked on the launch of gosave.ie, a new saver card that will enable Irish consumers to save hundreds of euro each year and find the best-value deals within their local communities and nationwide.  The gosave cards also provide a great opportunity for non-profit organisations to raise much-needed funds.

There’s been lots going on in DHR Communications for the past couple of months.  We’ve been really busy working with Irish Aid, the Government’s programme for overseas development, on its flagship Africa Day events: Africa Day Dublin, which took place in the Iveagh Gardens on Sunday, 16th May, and Africa Day Limerick, which took place in the grounds of Limerick City Hall on Sunday, 30th May.  Both events were a great success.  Once again, a huge thank you to all the volunteers who got involved in these events; to all the organisations and community groups that participated, and to all members of the public who came along.

In addition to Africa Day, we’ve also had lots of work to do on the Simon Cumbers Media Fund.  The deadline for the summer 2010 round of funding was Friday, 7th May, and 59 applications were received in total.  These are currently with the judging panel and the judges’ decisions will be announced shortly.

We’re also working on the Comhar Sustainable Development Media Fund, and there’s still time for interested applicants to apply: the deadline for this year’s funding round is Friday, 18th June, at 5pm.  Along with representatives of Comhar Sustainable Development Council, DHR facilitated a workshop for potential applicants last week.  A list of FAQs from that workshop can be accessed here.

Yesterday, we had the launch of the 2009 annual report of the Ombudsman for the Defence Forces, which received high levels of coverage across RTÉ and other broadcast outlets, and is featured in the national dailies today.  We’re also currently working with The Digital Hub on its annual Best in Show competition, and we’ve been doing some work with the British Council (Ireland) on its OPENCities project.

And, finally, we’re pleased to announce that we’ve recently been contracted to work withthe Building LGBT Communities Programme, which was established to build capacity among existing lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender organisations at a regional level.