Sixteen projects in Oxford are to receive a share of £600,000 to continue their work to help reduce rough sleeping and homelessness.

In December, Homelessness Minister Jeff Rooker announced that the city council was receiving the cash to help it tackle homelessness in the city. It spends about £4.5m a year dealing with the problem.

The executive board approved funding from April for projects including:

English Churches Housing Group, which will receive £56,000 to provide homeless accommodation and help homeless people find permanent accommodation.

Oxford Night Shelter, which will receive £73,000 for its work helping street drinkers into detoxification programmes.

Val Smith, executive member for housing, said: "This money will enable us to talk to people with a view to finding them support before they become homeless in the first place.

"The people we find sleeping rough are genuine cases. Oxford used to be a beggars' paradise, but since they were issued with antisocial behaviour orders last year, that is no longer the case.

"People on the streets encounter all sorts of problems. Some will not accept accommodation because they do not know what to do with their dogs.

"They get very attached to their pets and we are hoping to build a pound at the new nightshelter to help tackle this." Oxford received the second largest award of extra cash in the South East. Only Brighton and Hove got more, with an award of £900,000.

Last year, the city council, working with housing associations, the NHS and Thames Valley Police, established a new housing needs team.

The team is working to reduce the number of homeless families in temporary accommodation.

It ensures that homeless families with children are not placed in bed and breakfast accommodation unless it is an emergency.

It also tries to reduce the number of people living in temporary accommodation through tackling the main causes of homelessness -- eviction by parents, relatives and friends, and the loss of rented accommodation in the private sector.

Last year, it emerged that the Salvation Army was withdrawing money for its outreach project in St Giles, Oxford -- which has helped homeless people in the city for eight years -- after a survey suggested there were only a handful of people sleeping rough in the city.

But organisers and supporters said official figures produced by the city council "painted an unrealistic picture" of homelessness problems.