WHAT ARE PARTICIPATORY BUDGETS

The Participatory Budget is a participation mechanism of the municipality, through which citizens can propose and decide on the allocation of part of the municipal economic resources, thus establishing an effective channel for participatory.

Beyond the decision-making component, the Participatory Budget aims to incorporate into the process, actions aimed at improving communication channels with the public, as well as generating spaces for collective reflection on the demands and needs of the municipality.

It is with this motivation that the City Council of Benifallet has opened in 2020 the municipal budgets to citizen participation, more specifically to children, between 4 and 13 years, with the intention that it has continuity over time and that the age range of the participating citizens will be expanded, as well as the amount allocated.

Currently, there are mandatory legal frameworks around the child participation. With them as a reference, the government team is committed to increasing the participation of children as active citizens. The challenge, as a people, it to move forward in a committed way in promoting diverse and varied forms of child participation "with" and "from" children. 

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“Child participation is a right of children and an obligation of states and other administrations to comply with the various legal texts” (Convention on the Rights of the Child, among others).  

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GOAL

GENERAL OBJECTIVE:

• Implement an experience of participatory budgeting for children and young people the town of Benifallet, so that girls, boys and young people (primary and secondary) decide on a part of the public budget of the town from 202.

SPECIFIC OBJECTIVES:

• Raise awareness among children and young people in the municipality about the importance of acting responsibly and critically in decision-making, encouraging responsibility and seeking to increase the effectiveness and efficiency in the use of public resources.
• Foster in our children and young people processes of critical awareness, perticipation, debate and dialogue, which are fundamental in the implementation of a participatory democracy.
• To make participatory budgets known as an element of improvement, transformation and social change.
• Build citizenship and direct public resources to solving the problems of the municipality from the perspective of childhood and adolescence.
• Revitalize democracy and encourage a proactive citizenship of their own actions, from the perspective of the youngest.

WHO IS IT FOR?

This year we do a small tasting of citizen participation offering participation to primary school boys and girls. The intention, however, is to expand it to high school students as soon as possible.

This year 2020 we start with the little ones, thinking about the need to strengthen them and give them more confidence and security with the issue for the future incorporation of the older ones. Communication and assembly decision is intended and therefore the little ones need to be prepared enough to speak in front of boys and girls older than them.

LIMIT OF PARTICIPATORY ACTION 2020

This participatory action gives the citizens of the municipality between 4 and 13 years old, the ability to decide how they will be allocated 2.000€ of the municipal budget investment item for the year 2020. They will be able to participate in the process all students who are studying primary school at the Escola de Benifallet during the year 2020.

2020 PARTICIPATORY ACTION METHODOLOGY

1. Citizens who study primary school at the Benifallet School the participatory budgets, what this year's participatory action will be and how it will be carried out.

2. Information on participatory action and projects that can be voted on so that they have more information when deciding is published on the Benifallet City Council website, www.benifallet.cat.

3. The day September 15, 2020, coinciding with the International Day of Democracy, the vote will take place. It is planned to install an urn in the Santiago Rusiñol Librayr in the afternoon, from 17:30 to 19:00. There will also be the "vote by mail" option for those who are unable to vote in person that afternoon.

4. The result of the vote will be made public the next day, informing of the winning resources and / or projects through traditional media and social networks.

5. In the following days, Benifallet City Council will prepare a document compiling the results, emphasizing the ideas proposed on its own initative, to take this into account in the face of the participatory budgets for 2021.

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“It is false that children are the future citizens. Today, they are full citizens and therefore must be able to give their opinion and take is happening around them.” 

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INFORMATION BROCHURE

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