On 26 November 2022 Ozurgeti municipality will hold public consultations to develop the Open Government Partnership (OGP) Local Action Plan for 2023-2025. Consultations will be conducted by applying – “CivicLab”, an innovative consultation methodology developed by Council of Europe experts. The methodology will be implemented for the first time in Georgia in the framework of the Council of Europe project “Strengthening Participatory Democracy and Human Rights at Local Level in Georgia”.
“CivicLab” is an innovative tool designed for public consultations to establish a constructive and effective dialogue and interaction between stakeholders (public authorities, civil society organisations, media, representatives of education sector, private sector, international organisations) and citizens to make their voices heard in local decision-making, leading to an effective policy co-creation process. Through an open call, citizens of the municipality as well as local authority representatives were invited to register for the consultations. Considering the information provided by the applications, Council of Europe experts and the municipality selected 30 participants. Through applying a “traffic light” method, participants will be attributed proportionally to different groups so that multi-stakeholder participation is ensured in each group.
“CivicLab” will be applied to address community problems in Ozurgeti and formulate solutions: the methodology will allow participants to address problems within three thematic directions: anti-corruption, public finances, and service delivery, develop proposals and formulate relevant solutions through a structured approach offered by the methodology, which is organised in 5 main stages: identifying problems, developing ideas, assess the realisation of the ideas and planning.
Results of the public consultations will be reflected in the Open Government Partnership Action Plan 2023-2025 of Ozurgeti municipality.
