Citizen participation in the planning of actions that concern them, as well as the strengthening of volunteering, are a necessity for modern societies. Based on this principle, PRIORITY has developed an innovative digital platform with the brand name we co-create for the collection of citizens’ proposals for projects and actions of the Municipality or the local community, as well as for their evaluation and prioritization to increase participation and the objective evaluation of proposals. It is technically based on an electronic platform, which every citizen can enter and write – he / she proposes his / her idea. The citizen submits his idea in an easy and interactive way and the platform gathers all the ideas. The platform incorporates mechanisms for evaluating and highlighting the best idea, based on a defined rating. The platform aims to strengthen e-democracy and volunteering. Each idea can be voted on with likes, as in social media. Each vote gets a point, with a weighting factor, which is determined each time. The system has the ability to give a higher rating to ideas accompanied by a voluntary offer. The ideas that get the highest score can be selected (e.g. as the ideas of the month) and then evaluated as feasible as possible. At the same time, the “impact” that their implementation has on the population is estimated (cost of action / citizens concerned). The idea with the best “effect” is awarded and selected (e.g. as the idea of the month and implemented). In this way the following are achieved: • The Municipality and the local communities listen to the real needs of the citizens and make interventions in real needs (satisfied citizen) • The citizen can participate in the decisions of the Municipality (gamification). • The citizen co-creates (cocreation, modern European trend) • Direct democracy is strengthened • Volunteering is strengthened. Volunteers are located and can be better organized (fire safety teams, emergency management, etc.)
