Policies

Relevant City context

This project offers an example of successful cooperation between the public and private sectors. Through strong commitment from the municipalities care center and involvement of the design school, volunteer groups and local schools the goals of the project were achieved, facilitating social life for residents at the care center.

Goal: Improve the range social activities for people with physical and cognitive impairments

Individuals with physical and cognitive impairments have an increased risk of becoming alienated, commonly engaging in social activities mainly with care takers and family. This initiative was aimed at improving and preserving the quality of life for individuals with wide-ranging physical, cognitive, and communicative impairments by facilitating the creation of meaningful relationships outside the family. The project was carried out at Skansebakken, a housing and care facility for 45 people with severe physical and mental handicap. An additional expected benefit was to free staff hours. The project had three main phases. The first phase was led by Kolding design school in collaboration with staff and residents at Skansebakken. They utilized a variety of design methods to develop new and innovative solutions for the residents at the care home, including observations and workshop with stakeholders. Design solutions were iteratively evaluated with the participants and resulted in a digital tool. The designers further provided training for staff and residents to use the tool. Computer tablets were purchased for the residents to make it easier for them to present themselves and communicate with the outside world. In the next phase Skansebakken and Vejle municipality took lead on the project and the digital tool was tested and used in daily activities. The final phase of the project included an evaluation, which was further disseminated to other municipalities. The basis for the evaluation was a mapping of the residents’ relationships in January 2012, 2013, and 2014.

Collaboration between stakeholders

The project was a collaboration between public and private sectors, including education, the municipalities’ care center and the design school. The collaboration was regarded a success, a main factor being that the senior management in the municipality's care center was very committed to the project. Having leadership in the department backing the project up by personal involvement makes a difference.

Outcomes

The evaluation shows that the residents increased their level of social activity, strengthened bonds and made new friendships. The new friendships were mainly formed between the residents and volunteers from the local community, but also other people who took part in various activities at Skansebakken, visiting friends from the ULF (Development Disability Associations), Rødkilde Gymnasium (a local school) and former employees. Further, results from the project show that the organized activities resulted in improved relationships between residents at Skansebakken.

Resources

The project was funded by the National Board of Health who also evaluated the outcomes.

Related Links

See also the video http://www.designafrelationer.com/

Relevant city context

The project is relevant to the European Territorial Cooperation programs that support the delivery of innovation by actors in regional innovation chains in areas of “smart specialisation” and innovation opportunity.

Goal: Improve policies to support cities resilience

The projects main objective is improving policies for the delivery of innovation in public service applications designed to support/strengthen the capacity of cities and regions to prevent, resist, absorb and recover from societal and environmental risks/hazards (resilience). The envisioned policy instrument focuses on enhancement of regional and national innovative systems by supporting exchanges on results achieved via R&D projects and the cooperation between regional and interregional systems, maximizing networking between public and private stakeholders. Main objectives:   Identify and map the state of resilience against societal and environmental risks in the partner cities and regions, and the set-up of their related ecosystems;

Create an inventory of relevant resilience practices (best and worst) in Europe;

Define a methodological framework for benchmarking regional resilience in the context of the policy instruments addressed;

Exchange of experience on innovation in tools and models with the potential to enhance the resilience capacity of cities and regions to best deliver innovation in public service applications;

Identify mechanisms for transferring good practices on resilience between and within regions and cities, adapted to the different external influences (e.g. governance systems, cultural differences) and the nature of the challenges;

Develop and monitor the implementation of action plans for improved resilience capacity, building on lessons learned from the project.   

The reference tools for improvement are:

1) innovative projects (ie: best practices) for the development of new processes, aiming to stimulate exchange opportunities on qualified platforms and / or through networking between stakeholders, public and private bodies, and to gain greater funding opportunities;

2) regional innovative system through Open data/new ICT applications for e-government, to reinvigorate public policies and services and foster stakeholder engagement;

3) resilience to natural disasters and development of disaster management systems  

Cooperation among stakeholders

Today, the Lazio Region shows poor relationships between SMEs and public research in the management of common innovative projects. This issue will be addressed though the multidisciplinary competences in the project: citizens, NGOs and civil society are demanding better and more specific public solutions and services to prevent disasters. In addition, there is a growing number of unaddressed issues in terms of adaptation to climate change, poverty reduction, public safety, urban planning. Specialized knowledge is needed to capture the complexity of the problems, and efforts must be undertaken in order to reduce natural risks (ie: Geo-hydrological risk and mitigation). The City of Rome, in cooperation with the Lazio Region, will focus on developing the networking among public bodies, enterprises and research institutes, supporting the delivery of innovation in resilience management, aiming at the development of innovative tools to face natural disasters, protect the natural and cultural assets. The innovation is expected to enable the dialogue between public and private stakeholders, in a holistic vision of resilience strategies, according to an Open Governance paradigm driven by open public data and services, as well as facilitate the collaboration between design, production and delivery of public services.  

Outcomes

Expected outcomes of the project are:

1. Development of a methodological framework to perform resilience assessment following the structure of the SMR maturity model (see: http://smr-project.eu/tools/maturity-model-guide/)

2. Identification and analysis of challenges, gaps, governance systems, institutional frameworks, existing experiences, etc. – a benchmark of the territorial situation. The aim is to break down silos and identify innovation opportunities.

3. Exchange of experience among the partners, based on their own experiences, as opposed to "external sources", in order to identify potentially good practices. Presentation and validation of good practices by means of workshops, seminars, study tours and site visits, possibly also peer reviews and/or user and expert panels.  

Identification and analysis of best practice will be exchanged with the partners and disseminated to other interested EU regions. There will also be a validation of how the results of the interregional learning process could improve the policy instrument and support to promote and communicate the projects results. Results are expected to be a contribution to the development of a Regional Guideline based upon the lessons learned from the project – from which the policy instrument could be improved.  

Resources

Total Budget: 1.698.000 €

Budget for Rome: 202.000 €