Participatory budgets: town halls are involved in making decisions about money and schoolchildren
According to her, students will not only learn the principles of participation and democratic voting, but also financial literacy.
Each school will receive 50 thousand crowns
And how does participatory budgeting work in practice? Every year, all six primary schools established by the seventh city district are involved in the decision-making process. Each school will receive 50,000 crowns from the town hall. Pupils then tell what they are missing at school, what they would improve or change. The winning project for each school is then decided by voting.
“Nevertheless, much of the process had to be moved to the online space during the year, which did not detract from the quality and diversity of the designs. The most interesting projects included, for example, a rest area, didactic and game stickers for stairs and floors, or a school drum kit, ”added Šišková.
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The City Hall 10 also launched a school of Prague in its budget. Last year, it launched a pilot year of a participatory budget called My Footprint in a School, in which eight primary schools and one secondary school participate. Each will receive 35,000 crowns for one of their winning proposals.
Over 2.5 thousand students voted
“It made me very happy to have an incredible two and a half thousand pupils taking part. And the proposed projects? There was also the purchase of a cotton candy machine, a drinking fountain or an algae plant for each class, “described Lucie Sedmihradská, Councilor for Finance.
In Prague 10, the classic participatory budget Moje stopa has been operating since 2016, in which residents who have 7.5 million crowns at their disposal from the town hall coffers are involved. “Among the projects that have succeeded in recent years, I would mention the workout playground in Heroldovy sady, the playground in the Malešice park or the Children’s Anthill in the Forest at Bohdalec,” added Sedmihradská.
Minigolf and a place for edible fats
The equal million will be spent for the third year in a row by the Prague 22 town hall. The citizens will decide on the project in a survey. “Last year, thanks to the participatory budget, for example, minigolf and an adventure trail were built in Pitkovice, or six collection points for edible oils and fats were built,” said Veronika Blažková, a spokeswoman for Prague 22.
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Five times more than the town hall in Uhříněves, the sixth city district has prepared for participatory budgets. “Half of that – two and a half million crowns – will go to primary schools. The aim is to involve pupils in participation as a normal part of city life, to motivate them to improve the school, to raise awareness of project planning and a wide range of financial literacy, “Tereza Schejbalová, head of the Communication Department, told the Prague daily.
Among the extracurricular designs that have been implemented since 2017 were playgrounds, benches for the elderly or an insect hotel.
For exam
Newcomers to the participatory budget are in Prague 2, where the town hall has set aside – as in Prague 6 – up to five million crowns. “The pilot project was Good Idea for Dvojka, which started on August 1, 2021,” added Andrea Zoulová, a spokeswoman for the second district.
But there are also parts of the city that do not invest in participatory budgets. For example, at eight. “Our predecessors did not understand the process of redistributing money for projects quite happily. The projects were difficult to access for various reasons, including the financial situation of our district. Therefore, the town hall has selected from the proposed projects only some meaningful ones that can be implemented. Whether within your budget or using developers. One of such projects will be the skate park in Bohnice, “concluded Martin Šalek, spokesman for Prague 8.