Title of the project: Concept for the New Web-Page of Tbilisi City Hall
Financial Support of the Project: "Open Society-Georgia" Foundation (OSGF)
Budget of the Project: $ 24680
Duration of the project: October 2014 - February 2015

Long term perspective of the project

With creation and implementation of a new concept of the web-page of Tbilisi City Hall guaranteed proactive access of the public information and formation of a citizen-oriented informational web-system.

Objectives of the Project:

• Increasing the level of transparency and accountability of Tbilisi City Hall;
• Promoting effective and transparent spending of public funds;
• Supporting the development of freedom of information via establishing the standards of e-democracy;
• Improving the public control on the public service agencies with the involvement of the citizens, ngo sector and media;
• Informing the citizens and increasing their engagement in the discussion and decision-making process in the public sector.

Project Description

Specifying the Project (Analysis of the current state)

For years citizens were putting questions about the accountability and transparency of the Tbilisi City Hall. This was mainly caused by not having the financial and other kind of data about the Tbilisi City Hall and the non-commercial and private legal persons that where under its subordination. At the same time journalists and other interested persons were not given the possibility to evaluate level of effectiveness and fullfillment of the obligations by the decision making personalities of the Tbilisi City Hall that was mainly caused by the restriction of the access to public information. Besides citizens were not equipped with the legal mechanizms and methods that would give them the opportunity for fully taking part in the city governance.

We think that, on the one hand, for eradication of these problems, it is very important to inform citizens and to have a maximum transparency in the financial and other key data about the Tbilisi City Hall. On the other hand, the abovementioned agency should start implementing services that oriented on citizens activities and involvments. Formation of a new web-page will have utmost importance to accomplish these aims. We have advised our view to Tbilisi City Hall – about issues that we think is essential for eradicating the current problems and implementing new trends.

Project Implementation Ways

Strategy

• The study of the internal procedures of the Tbilisi City Hall and logicasl designation of the frames of business-procedures;
• The determination of the current public requirements towards the new web-page;
• The collaboration of the concept and the prototype of the web-page.

Methods of Implementation

The study of the internal procedures of the Tbilisi City Hall and logical designation of the frames of business-procedures

Tbilisi City Hall, as a system, is one of the biggest and most difficult, from the governance point of view, public body. In order to determine the content of the web-page, to unify the standards of the disclosure of the public information, to combine the current information about municipalities, commercial entities and non-commercial legal persons in a single system and to draw out corresponding procedural documents, it is necessary to work up and research the internal business-procedures and the information about the management.

On the first stage of the project, it is planned to collect and analyze the information about the internal managerial procedures of the Tbilisi City Hall with the collaboration of the corresponding personalities of the Tbilisi City Hall. Initial studies of the work up, exchange and publishing of the information in the Tbilisi City Hall and its structural or dependant bodies is essential for effective functioning, sharing the responsibilities and obligations, evaluating administrative resources and technical opportunities, for integration and development in current and upcoming electronic service web-page.

The determination of the current public requirements towards the new web-page
It is important to understand the expectations and the requirements of the consumers (both from the side of service and information recipients) of the web-page in order to determine its functional and the content. From one point availability of public information is important, and from the other point, Tbilisi City Hall offers various services and programs to habitants of Tbilisi. Accordingly, both informational content sector and services, applications and other activation mechanisms of involvement sector should be integrated in the web-page. Correspondingly, it is necessary to determine the priorities of the web-page from the functional point of view. Public meeting with the relevant organizations and experts will help us in drawing out the additional indicators that must be taken into account in creating the technical assignment project.

At the same time it is important to research the best international practice, based on which the modern technical and innovative projects should be offered. The analysis of the innovative systems or transparency mechanisms of the web-pages of the foreign countries municipalities will assist the project’s team to consider the modern standards, and on the other hand to work out the conceptual document and recommendations based on the arguments and international practice.

The collaboration of the concept and the prototype of the web-page

After the research of the administrative and consumers sides, based on the received information and international practice the detailed description of the web-page will be drawn out that implies:

• Preparation of the description of the structure and navigation of the web-page;
• Preparation of the necessary technical instruction for collaborating of the web-page;
• Designation of the structure of the division of public information and open data and its management optimizing plan;
• Determination of the structure of involvement applications (platform of petitions, online platform for defending the nature and cultural heritage; public consultations platform);
• Preparation of technical instruction for the systemic requirements of the web-page and for the cyber-safety regulations;
• Preparation of the content sharing, basic functional and navigation descriptive HTML prototype.

Finished document, recommendations, the model of the web-page prototype and procedural documents will be presented on the name of the Tbilisi Mayor further for its technical creation.

Tbilisi City Hall, based on the collaborated conception of the initial agreement, particularly, non-commercial NNLE “Tbilisi Portal” will start the creation process of the web-page of Tbilisi City Hall. Consequently, consultations of the Tbilisi City Hall employees and the monitoring process of the performed activities will be important for the proper conduct of this process.

The Timeline of the Project

Budget