Benidorm obtains a grant of 10,000 euros from the Diputación to promote transparency, good governance and citizen participation

The Provincial Council of Alicante has approved the granting of two grants of 5,000 euros each to the Benidorm City Council, 100% of the amount requested, for the promotion and encouragement of citizen participation, transparency and good governance, according to the figure in the resolution published in the BOP on July 20.

The first subsidy corresponds to the promotion of citizen participation while the second subsidizes activities related to transparency and good governance. In Benidorm, the City Council will use both subsidies for the implementation of a citizen participation portal and a budget viewer.

To carry it out, the City Council will use a platform as a direct communication channel between governments and citizens. This platform allows local entities to offer a set of services that encompass both specific services such as Participatory Budgets or the Promotion of Employability, or transversal services applicable both individually and in any situation, such as active advertising or prior appointments integrated.

In the case of the Citizen Participation portal, it is a multi-language solution that incorporates Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) in participatory budgeting processes "which facilitates participation and management and at the same time increases the transparency” explained councillor Ana Pellicer.

The objective, the mayor has specified, is "to bring the neighbours closer to public management, from co-responsibility, since the knowledge they have of the environment in which they live is essential to improve life in the municipality." Therefore, she said to Pellicer "we have always understood that active listening must be one of the pillars of our government because it is the best way to meet the needs of citizens."

One of the functions of this portal will be to collaboratively generate a space for deliberation and prioritization of the proposals for investment projects and/or services that are formulated within the framework of the citizen consultation. "What we are looking for is to enable all possible instruments to improve citizen participation and involvement" added Pellicer.

The second subsidy, related to the installation of a budget viewer, is an application in the cloud that facilitates access to public information in a clear and orderly manner. "It is an interactive solution that allows you to visualize how the budgets of public administrations are distributed and shows graphically and simply the origin of the income and what the expense is dedicated to" has detailed Aida García Mayor, Councilor for Finance and Innovation. The mayor has stressed that this "is not only intended to open a window of public management, but to show the reality of income and expenses both in budget planning and in subsequent execution."

This service will allow people involved in the management of public funds "to have clear and measurable objectives and also account for how much is spent and what it is spent on."

The data that this budget viewer will offer will be presented contextualized simply so that any citizen can understand at a first glance the impact of the items on the global budget and its distribution” indicated the counsellor.