Grant for other associations promoting sport and physical activity

These grants focus on physical activities for children and young people, the elderly and special groups, as well as the volume of activities. This grant is discretionary.  

It may be awarded upon application to clubs and associations that meet the following criteria: 

1. The applicant's declared residence is in Helsinki, and the activities are open to all residents. The subject activities must be primarily targeted at Helsinki residents. 
2. The applicant association must be registered with the Finnish Patent and Registration Office in accordance with the Associations Act, and it must have been active for one whole calendar year before applying for the grant. The activities of the association must be well established. This does not apply to associations that have changed their name, divisions of associations that have been registered as independent associations or a full or partial merger of the activities of two or more associations that have previously received grants. 
3. The applicant must organise regular guided physical activities for the same group at least ten times during a continuous period of three months, taking into account the nature of the activity. Associations for the elderly and special groups must arrange regular physical activities for the same group.

4. At least 50 of the association’s active members, or alternatively 20 active members under the age of 20, whose residence is in Helsinki, must participate in the association’s directed exercise activities.  Regular physical activities of the associations for the elderly and special groups must be attended by an appropriate amount of participants with the expected functional capacity. In the application, active members are considered those that participate in regular, directed physical activities intended for a fixed group at least 10 times during a contiguous 3-month period. The regular activities must be the association’s own non-profit activities and do not include sports activities that are purchased from the city or implemented in cooperation with the city. A person may be reported as an active member only once, even if the same person participates in multiple exercise groups over the course of the year.

5. The organised activities must be the club’s own activities. Activities acquired from the city as a purchased service or activities realised in cooperation with the city are not considered own activities. The activities must not aim for profit.

The applicant must comply with the principles of good governance, the ethical principles for sports communities and  principles of the UN convention on the rights of the child in all its operations. 

• Read the ethical principles for sports communities(Link leads to external service) (pdf, in Finnish).
• Read the principles of good governance for associations(Link leads to external service) (pdf, in Finnish).
• Read the principles of the UN convention on the rights of the child (in Finnish)(Link leads to external service)

The grant cannot exceed 80 percent of the eligible expenditure. ‘Eligible expenditure’ refers to costs incurred for the sports activities of the association. Loan repayments, interest and write-offs, depreciation, provisions or any other calculated items that are not based on actual costs are not taken into account as expenditure incurred for the activities.

The application for other associations promoting sport and physical activity grant opens at the beginning of the year and ends on February 15. Grants must be applied for within the application period specified. If an application is not submitted by the deadline, it will be regarded as late and rejected.

The grant is primarily applied for through the operating and facility usage grant application form.

Click here(Link leads to external service) for instructions on how to use the e-services to apply for a grant and how to log in.

In exceptional cases, the grant application may be submitted to the City Register Office at City of Helsinki Register Office, Culture and Leisure Division/Sports, PO Box 10, FI-00099 City of Helsinki, Finland (street address: City Hall, Pohjoisesplanadi 11–13). Applications submitted to the City Register Office must arrive by 15.00 on the last day of the application period.

The application must be accompanied with the mandatory attachments specified for each grant, a list of which is available below.

For the application to be processed, applicants must attach the mandatory documents to the application form. The mandatory attachments to an application for a grant for other association promoting physical activity are:

• Action plan for the application year
• Budget for the application year
• Financial statements (most recently confirmed, the previous year or the year before)
• Audit or operations report (most recently confirmed, the previous year or the year before)
• Annual report (most recently confirmed, the previous year or the year before)

If the applicant has not previously applied for any grants from the City of Helsinki or if any of the relevant information has changed, the following documents must also be attached to the application:

• Rules of the association
• A notice from the bank on the account holder or a copy of a bank statement (the applicant must have its own Finnish bank account into which the grant will be paid)
• An extract from the Register of Associations

If the applicant wishes that regular guided sessions organised by the applicant in facilities owned and/or managed by other organisations and in school gyms are taken into account in the processing of the application, they must also fill out the facility usage document.  

Decisions on the grants are made by the Sports Sub-committee. Decisions are expected to be made in April. The grant decisions, including the instructions for appeal, will be sent for information to all applicants.

See previous decisions of the Sport Sub-committee on the page of the Sports Sub-committee(Link leads to external service).

The grant will be paid in accordance with the grant decision in one instalment into a bank account specified by the recipient. If the recipient does not have a bank account, they must open one. The City of Helsinki will only pay a grant into a bank account in the name of the recipient. 

A prerequisite for the granting and payment of the grant is that there have been no discrepancies regarding any grants awarded by the city to the recipient in previous years. The city has the right to suspend the payment of a grant until the matter has been resolved if there is reason to suspect that the prerequisites for the recovery of a grant specified in Section 10 of the general grant criteria of the City of Helsinki are met.

The city has the right to set off the grant in whole or in part against a recoverable claim from the recipient.

The grant for other associations promoting physical activity must be used for the association’s non-profit sporting activities. The grant must be used during the year in which it was awarded, unless otherwise specified in the decision.

The grant cannot be used for fundraising or for business and investment expenditure, or to increase the association’s financial assets or any other long-term investments. The grant cannot be forwarded to other associations or distributed as individual grants to members. The funds must be used for the operations of the association in general.

The recipient must notify the City of Helsinki without delay of any significant change affecting the use of the grant.

The use of the grant will be investigated in connection with the application for the following year’s grant. The application form includes a separate section for this, and the mandatory attachments submitted with the application form are a part of reporting the last year's grant as well.

If the applicant has received a grant for other associations promoting physical activity in previous year but is not applying for a grant in current year, the applicant must submit a separate report on the use of the previous year grant to liikunta.avustukset@hel.fi (Link opens default mail program).  The report must be submitted by the end of September of the year following the grant year. The report must indicate the use and allocation of the grant. Furthermore, approved financial statements, an annual report and an audit report for previous year must be attached to the email.ail.

Instructions on completing the application form 2024(Link leads to external service) (pdf, in Finnish)

Read more about the other documents governing the award, use and reporting of grants for sports on the Guidance and support page(Link leads to external service).

The contact details of personnel providing personalised guidance on sports grants are available on the Contact details page(Link leads to external service).