“Compass Research, Education and Consulting Center” NGO and its partners “NGO Center” Civil Society Development NGO, “Youth Cooperation Center of Dilijan” NGO, “Information Systems Development and Training Center” NGO, is implementing the “Participatory Monitoring for the Creation of Smart Communities in Armenia” project. It is implemented in the scope of a grant allocated by the “Commitment to Constructive Dialogue” project (CCD) funded by the European Union.
The objective of the project was to explore, analyze and evaluate the fields of preservation, use and renovation of inter-community roads and streets, waste management and sanitary cleaning, inter-community street lighting, identify the existing problems, develop and submit to the local government a package of proposals for alternative solutions to the problems, analyze the effectiveness of targeted communities’ budget funds through participatory monitoring, to assist in the development and implementation of more effective public services provided by targeted municipalities.
On 29 May, the final event of the program was held in Gyumri, during which the results of the work done in three areas, packages of the proposals to the policy makers and the local self-government bodies were presented.
Governor of Shirak region Tigran Petrosyan, Deputy Minister of Territorial Administration and Development Vache Terteryan, heads of large communities involved in the program and other officials were present at the meeting.
In his welcoming speech, Gharib Harutyunyan, President of “Compass Center” NGO, presented the goals and importance of the project. “In the idea of our project, we have the idea that community development should be achieved through trilateral, state – communities – civil society platform, and we have worked with this model within this program. In addition, “HamzaZark” Coalition has been created, which includes 34 non-governmental organizations from all regions of Armenia,” Gharib Harutyunyan said.
Mr. Vache Terteryan, the RA Deputy Minister of Territorial Administration and Development, attached importance to the initiative and expressed an opinion that there was a need for this at the moment. “It is time to create new impressions and conclusions as a result of monitoring and research in expert and professional platforms that will allow to finds and to apply more effective solutions in the local self-governance system. In my conviction, the unity of communities is a bigger chance of reform, but it will not be of itself, without effort, without purposefulness. Specifically, the selected three areas are currently the most discussed areas, as large-scale activities are being carried out within the framework of large communities. This platform should rather raise the ways to solve the problems than the problems themselves as they are mainly visible,” Vache Terteryan said.
Shirak Governor Tigran Petrosyan talked about the practical significance of the program, expressing gratitude to the implementing agencies and the European Union. “This is not just a result of comprehensive statistical information on the state of these sectors in the communities, but also a very useful methodology for evaluating communities’ work. This is a good tool to perceive the final result that will be assessed by the local self-governance bodies, because very often communities have the desire and willingness to do good work, but there are difficulties in the methodology and this tool will enable them to better understand the criteria and achieve good results,” Tigran Petrosyan said.
On behalf of the “Commitment to Constructive Dialogue” Project team, Mr. Emin Yeritsyan, President of the Union of Communities of Armenia, highly appreciated the work of the “Participatory monitoring for the Establishment of Smart Communities in Armenia” Project team and the results achieved. “We have targeted different spheres, one of which is local self-governance, and in this area we have set a goal to achieve a change in policies as a result of community-civil society cooperation, and this program responds very well to the problem. This program first provides feedback based on the professional indices related to on the services provided by the communities and I agree that these activities can be popularized and conducted in other communities as well. The second result is the creation of the “HamaZarK” Coalition. This has turned this process into a movement and has a tendency to bring positive changes,” Emin Yeritsyan said.
Further, the project manager Haykaram Drmeyan presented the summary of the project reports, addressing the problems of waste management, street lighting and intra-community road maintenance. Coordinators of Lori and Tavush Marzes Susan Hovsepyan and Arthur Ghazaryan presented “HamzaZarK” Coalition, its objectives and the work done in this direction.
The reports “Participatory monitoring for the Establishment of Smart Communities in Armenia” Project are available at the following link:
The Project budget is AMD 24986,000, of which AMD 22516000 is provided by the “Commitment to Constructive Dialogue” Project. The project duration is 1 June, 2018 to 30 May, 2019. The “Commitment to Constructive Dialogue” Project is funded by the European Union.
