Putting People First: Building Sustainable Cities with Communities

Putting People First: Building Sustainable Cities with Communities. This was the theme for one of the SD Learning sessions presented by LEAD International at Rio+20 Summit. The workshop provided a brief overview of LEAD mission and activities, followed by case study presentations focused on the social pillar of sustainable development and how it relates to the built environment. The panelists presented three case studies from the Favelas of Rio de Janeiro, the townships of Port Elizabeth in South Africa and downtown Calgary in Canada where project teams led by “LEAD fellows” engaged stakeholders in the development of their projects and encouraged community action.

The project in the Favelas of Rio was presented by Leonardo Martins Dias and tackled a very important challenge, for Brazil especially, which is hosting Rio+20, the World Cup and the Olympic games within a very short timeframe. How to capitalize on major events and ensure that they will leave a legacy to host cities/communities, particularly to deprived groups? The presenter focused his talk on the process of engaging people in the Favelas as part of the development of community projects. This process builds up on good understanding of the needs of the community through effective dialogue;  a good communication plan to build up endorsement and visibility within the Favelas and with external stakeholders;  co-creation or collaborative project development with emphasis on capacity building, leadership development, fostering autonomy and engagement; and effective  project follow up and monitoring.

The second project from South Africa tackled the topic of “Sense of Place” through a case study presentation from the townships of Port Elizabeth. The project which is called Zanemvula (which means new beginnings and blessings in the local language), is a community relocation from a slum built on a flood plain to a purpose built social housing development in a different site. The project significantly improved the living conditions of the local population but also triggered community instability, public violence and for some dwellers return to the floodplain. The presenter, Anton de Wit, argued that this is linked to the loss of sense of place and presented some supporting examples to illustrate his view. One of these examples is the “water well” in the old slum where women used to meet to chat and take a break away from their households. In the new compound, the houses are connected to potable water networks, which meant that women lost their opportunity for socializing. No other alternative was available since the construction of the houses had to be completed fast before an election deadline and the community ended up built with no supporting community facilities such as schools, clinic, parks...etc

The last project presented was the Bow to Bluff initiative from Calgary. The presenter, John Lewis, presented a citizen initiative that aimed to improve public spaces around a transit corridor in downtown Calgary after the introduction of a new Light Rail Transit line. This was a very innovative and successful public engagement initiative where people from everywhere in the city of different ages and from various social groups collectively shared their ideas and re-imagined what this transit corridor should look like. The project team implemented numerous platforms for interaction ranging from idea wallboads, to design workshops and social media and managed to achieve a strong engagement from the public, businesses and the local government. More information can be found on the Bow to Bluff Process Guide.

This session left me with a few valuable take-aways:

• There are four “prerequisites” to sustainable cities: (1) equality, (2) engagement, (3) sense of place and (4) sustainability.

• Acting at a local level is the most efficient way to tackling the challenges facing neighborhoods cities and maximizing opportunities to transform them into more sustainable ones.

• The engine for change is people. They have to be engaged from the onset to define the destiny of their communities. Effective engagement relies on leadership, network, and “Co-creation”.

Your thoughts?

Thoughts on Open Government for Tunisia

Let me start by saying that I am new to this “OpenGov”, “OpenData” business. The first time I heard about it was a few weeks ago when a fellow Tunisian tweeple used the hashtag  #OpenGovTN in a tweet. I briefly researched the topic then, and was immediately intrigued by this idea or “governing doctrine which holds that citizens have the right to access the documents and proceedings of the government to allow for effective public oversight” [Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_government]. Like many Tunisians who experienced decades of information blackout –and often dis-information-, it wasn’t hard for me to get interested and decide to join OpenGovTN, a group of 200+ other like-minded people advocating an Open Government for Tunisia.

This initiative is still at the stage of “idea” today. Members of the Group are getting to know each other, case studies in other countries are being discussed and isolated actions are being initiated (e.g. an informal consultation on the Internal Laws draft proposed by the National Constituting Assembly). The Group activity has been significant to date and this only reflects the level of enthusiasm of its members. However, it also calls for a “plan” that can transform the “idea” into “reality”. The Group needs to set a clear vision and objectives for this initiative and establish a clear governance.

In this blog entry, I wanted to share my own initial thoughts on the above:

•  An Open Government must allow for a two-way open and constructive dialogue between the Government and the People. The information must flow in both directions where the Government describes its strategies and ongoing activities and where the People can voice their opinions, raise their concerns, inform priority setting and express their satisfaction or non-satisfaction. Regular polling should be used for this purpose.
• The Open Government platform must be accessible by all Tunisians and should not be restricted to only those who have Internet access. Open source crowd-sourcing platforms such Ushahidi (www.ushahidi.com) present a tremendous opportunity to gather input and feedback via SMSs sent from the simplest mobile phones.
• The information exchanged must also be of good quality and intelligible. The Government and the People must establish a common language based on quantitative and qualitative indicators that are understood by all. E.g. when talking about poverty, more specific measures must be defined such as income thresholds, accessibility to food, shelter, healthcare, education and information…etc
• The platform should be flexible to cover as many issues as possible; however, in its initial phase it must be focused on the burning issues; those affecting the well being of individuals and communities.
• Access to information must be timely. Government activity typically follows a four stage process: (1) issue identification, (2) strategy development, (3) implementation of actions and (4) evaluation of results. The People must influence each stage.
• A particular attention must be given to the way information will be communicated to a variety of user groups. Effective communication will require mechanisms for data filtering, sharing and visualization. The use of succinct infographics and mapping though Geospatial Information Systems (GIS) are effective tools for this purpose.
• The group needs an official presence and could be set up as an NGO or a research institute.
• The Group’s governance could be made of (1) an advisory board of experts, (2) a framework committee to set and maintain the initiative’s vision and objectives and (3) working groups to tackle: content, technical infrastructure, outreach and operations.

Through this initiative, we need to ensure that the flame that started the Tunisian revolution keeps burning and that the tremendous energy and solidarity displayed in theses early days is maintained and channeled in the most pertinent and effective way to inform decision making in the new Republic.