CIVITAS FOUNDATION FOR CIVIL SOCIETY

And we are …

… a non-governmental, non-for-profit organization established in 1992 in Odorheiu Secuiesc, Romania with the mission to stimulate local and regional development. When talking of development, we mean a process by which the members of a community increase their personal and institutional capacities to mobilize and manage resources in order to produce sustainable and justly distributed improvements in their quality of life consistent with their own aspirations.

Why did we come to being?

The main reasons for founding Civitas were the need to enhance public administration capacity and stimulate citizen's involvement in decision-making and local governance, involving human rights protection, civic education and the quality of our environment.
The start was successful, we established two regional offices: one in Cluj-Napoca and one in Odorheiu Secuiesc. The results obtained during these 12 years allow us to say that the organization has succeeded in closely abiding by the set goals. Although we have also undertaken projects that did not target local public administrations, Civitas Foundation has become known as an organization that assists institutions or organizations involved in local and regional development processes.

How do we work?

Our main fields of activity are:
- Project management -Civitas has undertaken several projects that targeted local development in various regions of Romania and international level in South Eastern Europe. In the 12 years of existence, approximately 50 projects have been administered.
- Consulting - based on the request of various beneficiaries, we undertook numerous sessions of consulting in the areas of local development, public administration, project writing and management, development of sustainable development strategies.
- Training -we have initiated and conducted several training sessions for public servants, and NGO activists from Romania, mainly focusing on counties from Transilvania and Banat region. The topics included: management (public management, human resource management, non-profit management), finances, communication, environmental management, etc.
- Studies and researches, all our project initiatives are based on studies conducted preliminary. On the other hand Civitas conducted large scale studies both domestically and internationally. We mention here the research report Youth Issues and Challenges in South Eastern Europe (http://www.civitas.ro/docs/yic.pdf - available in English), commissioned by the Citizens' Pact for SEE. Another study worth mentioning focused on the map of actors and issues regarding Romania's accession to the European Union with reference to the chapter on regional development (http://www.civitas.ro/docs/dezvoltare2.pdf - available in Romanian) - this study was commissioned by the European Commission's Delegation in Bucharest and the Open Society Foundation Romania.

Who do we work with?

- public administration institutions, from local, county and national level
- non-governmental organizations,
- private enterprises
- other institutions involved in the local -development process

And what have we been working on?

Current programs

2003 - Citizens and Governance program was developed based on one of our initial reasons for establishing the foundation: stimulating citizens involvement in decision-making and local governance. For several years, we have been dealing with the need for more citizens involvement in decision-making and including it as reasoning for most of our projects, even if the focus was on dealing with public administration, with final aim of opening up the public administration to citizens needs. The final push and input for developing this programme was the involvement in the Citizens Pact for SEE network, within which we run an international project in year 2002, that resulted in completing our initial determination with an international dimension. This program aims to promote more active citizen involvement in local governance; to share experience in involving citizens in decision-making processes, targeting mainly the Central and South Eastern Europe region; to foster co-operation between the municipalities and NGOs in view of building up regional cooperation in promoting participation and thus supporting community development.
One of the projects run within this program is Youth in Motion: Citizen participation in local governance, currently running. Within this project, we aim to promote more active citizen participation in local governance by finding and promoting model / best practice examples in the SEE region, which involve a partnership of the local authorities and NGOs. This project involves among the main objectives:
" share the experience of involving citizens in decision-making processes in SEE
" provide active professional assistance for the further development of these projects
" disseminate relevant information regarding citizen's participation in governance and transparency in decision making on local level,
" foster co-operation between municipalities and NGOs, under the umbrella of the Citizens' Pact for SEE, in view of building up regional cooperation in promoting participation and thus supporting community development
" build a website where relevant information can be accessed in an up-to-date basis in English
Please check the website of the project: www.seemotion.org for more details on the developments of this project.

2003 Local Development Officer - Pilot project which aimed to develop the capacity of local authorities to manage the issue of development at local level and implement the function of local development officer in 10 communes from Cluj and Bistrita-Nasaud counties, as precondition of supporting and stimulating the rural development process in the targeted areas. The project activities was structured in several components: formative, informative and active assistance, in view of maximizing information transfer, and increase local authorities capacities in managing local development processes, in working closer with the communities for local development. As result, 9 out of 10 communes included in their structure the function of local development officer.

2004 - Rural Portal - We have recently launched the Portal of Rural communities from Romania (www.rural-portal.ro), aiming to be a useful resource for rural communities and a tool for interaction among all actors involved in the process of rural development in Romania. The portal was launched with the occasion of the international workshop Rural communities and the Internet, held in Cluj-Napoca in 5-8 February, 2004 with support from the East-East Programme of the Open Society Foundation. The main objective of the portal is to optimize the informational flow towards development agents in rural areas and also to ensure a better communication between actors involved in the development process of rural communities. Another essential objective of the Rural-Portal is to promote development opportunities for the rural communities in order to improve the existing economic and social standards.

2002 onwards - Citizens' Counselling Office in Odorheiu Secuiesc - developing a durable partnership, between the Civitas Foundation and the Local Authority of Odorheiu Secuiesc, in the field of offering employment in counselling and information for the citizens of this town. The main objective was the creation of an 'Office for Informing Citizens' and taking part in putting down the basis of a network of offices for their information, which would be organized on a national level. The target group of the project is formed from the citizens of Odorheiu Secuiesc (40,000 inhabitants). In order to implement this project the following main activities are be carried out: founding the 'Office for Informing Citizens' (employing a competent personnel, furnishing the office, documentation); permanent informing and counselling activities of this office in defined fields; promotional activities; periodical evaluations that lead to the realization of the objectives. The project is financed by the Ministry of Public Finances - PHARE Office of contracting and payments.

Long Distance education for public administration (SEDAP) - From 1993 onwards we have included in our work a component of training for civil servants, both elected and appointed - this component was included in projects with public administration. The trainings covered various topics, from conflict management to public management, legislative informative sessions, etc. In 1999 this project-based training turned into a stable program of long-distance education for public administration (SEDAP). This strategic program of Civitas aims to enhance the efficiency of the public servants and elected representatives of local and regional public administration institutions from Romania - by providing training to them based on a training kit developed. with the goal of developing a distance education system in Romania, for mayors, local counselors and public officials. The project targets several areas of most interest in Local Public Administration: public strategic and operative management, communication and public relations, financial management of local communities, human resource management, project management, and sustainable development (with materials available in Romanian and Hungarian). This program covers several counties of Transylvania, such as Alba, Cluj, Covasna, Harghita, Mures si Satu Mare, Bihor counties, and was in 2003 expanded to cover Timis and Caras Severin counties. Funding has been provided by Open Society Foundation the PHARE Program of the European Commission, and by the Illyés Foundation, Hungary.

Among our projects we mention the following:

2003 - SANSZ - We have been involved in the elaboration of the Social Development Strategy of Odorheiu Secuiesc, an analysis and debate material in the actual situation, a starting point for all social actors, an incentive towards co-operation. The publication has been elaborated in the framework of the Local Partnership for Efficient Social Assistance project and it had been supported by the European Union through the PHARE Programme Civil Society Development 2000. This social development strategy is a daring attempt on Odorhei level, trying to harmonise the activities of all institutions, organisations and individuals working in the social field in order to support their fellow being. We strongly believe that we gather more efficiency together as it says in our slogan, too: Partnership today, a chance for tomorrow!

More about this project on: http://www.sansz.ro/ - site available in Romanian and Hungarian.
2002 - Community Involvement in Local Environment Management - The project was elaborated based on the needs to protect and preserve the environment, as identified and discussed at international level, during meetings, occasions on which consensus was obtained for the ways to achieve sustainable development. In this sense, we aim to develop and carry out a real action plan for the 21st century.
This project aims to be a model of collaboration between the non-governmental sector and the local public administration with regard to one of the aspects of sustainable development, that is environment protection. Moreover, we aim to develop a set of instruments to be used as model, available for local authorities in parallel to their training to use them for solving issues connected to environment protection and sustainable development. The project was financed by the ACCESS program of the European Commission.

2001 - 2002 - PRICAP- Regional Training and Consulting Program for Local Governments - aimed to develop professional and management abilities of local councilors and employees of local governments, in order to enable them to build up strategies for sustainable local development, as well as to draft out, to identify funds for and to implement local sustainable development projects. The project was financed by Local Public Administration Modernization Fund - PHARE and by the "Új Kézfogás" Foundation.

2000 - 2001 "FoCoS" pilot project for the integrated development of the micro-region "Câmpia Transilvaniei" - We aim to increase the professional performance of the elected councilors and appointed officers of the local governments within the micro-region "Câmpia Transilvaniei" (Transylvania's Low Midlands) - formed by the communities of Caianu, Cojocna, Suatu Palatca and Sic - with the perspective of the elaboration of integrated regional development strategies. The project was financed by Open Society Foundation.

2001 - Effective local government - followed the FOCOS project, aiming to support local governments in their efforts to move away from the crisis mode in which they function. More specifically, the project assisted the setting up of a more transparent, articulated and inclusive local policy-making process in the Transylvania's Low Midlands. In this sense, the local government institutions had the occasion to get acquainted with the methods of strategic management of public goods in order to ensure a quality service toward its constituencies and be able to become a viable partner for local initiatives. The project was funded by Westminster Foundation for Democracy.

Manage Efficiently - Aimed to contribute to the adjustment efforts of local governments to the new legislation referring to the public administration, through information seminars organized for mayors and local counselors. The project was financed by the Illyés Foundation.

NGO Resource Center - In order to bring stability to the NGO community, Civitas agreed to act as an organizational and technical consultant in the area of non--profits beginning from 1997. The project was logistically and financially supported by the CENTRAS.
Electronic Parliament -- Parliament Offices were wired for Internet access, yet virtually none of the legislative staff knows how to make use of this powerful tool. Through several workshops, Civitas educated during 1996 the Romanian MPs about the informational resources available through the Internet.

Partnerships

During our activities, we have established partnerships with several county and local councils from Transylvania.
Among our academic partners, we mention the long-term collaborations with the Department of Public Administration, Babes-Bolyai University, and with the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Centre for Regional Studies.
In addition, we have cooperated with several non-governmental organizations and provided assistance to small private enterprises, in our efforts to encourage and develop public-private partnerships in the communities we work with.
Within our work towards achieving our mission, we work more within two networks:
RuralNet- Network of organizations from Romania active in the area of community development - http://www.ruralnet.ro
Citizens' Pact for SEE - http://www.citizenspact.org.yu