OZONE – Open and Accountable Municipalities, SDC OZONE – Open and Accountable Municipalities, SDC - OZONE – Open and Accountable Municipalities Organisationen "Institute for Development and European Integration" (IREI), registrerad i BiH som medborgarförening, har ansökt om Sida-finansiering på 1 800 000 SEK för att genomföra projektet "OZONE - Öppna och ansvariga kommuner "i Bosnien och Hercegovina under perioden maj 2021 - maj 2023. OZONE-projektet syftar till att skapa och stödja den politiska viljan för en mer medborgarcentrerad politik på kommunnivå.

Tillvägagångssättet är att välja motiverade nyvalda borgmästare och förse dem och deras kommunala personal med stöd från experter med erfarenhet av styrning för att göra det möjligt för borgmästarna att fastställa ett nytt policyprogram (NPP) med specifika och mätbara mål under de två första åren av deras mandat. Borgmästare och kommuner kommer att väljas utifrån visat intresse, geografisk mångfald och potentiell påverkan. Innehållet i varje NPP bör överensstämma med befintliga lokala utvecklingsstrategier, men även omfatta interna administrativa förändringar, besparingar och nya metoder för att stärka kommunens öppenhet och ansvarsskyldighet gentemot medborgarna. OZONE-projektet kommer att arbeta tillsammans med varje kommun för att upprätta ett uppföljningssystem för genomförandenivån för varje NPP-mål. Nya metoder, inklusive uppföljning och genomförande, kommer att implementeras genom ett utbildningsprogram anpassat för varje kommun. Den sista projektkomponenten är att upprätta eller stärka kommunikationsplattformar (sociala medier, appar etc) för kontakt med medborgarna, samt tillhandahålla frekventa och tydliga uppdateringar till medborgarna om kommunens framsteg mot de fastställda målen.

OZONE-projektet kompletterar och bygger på befintligt arbete med kommunal utvecklingsplanering och medborgardeltagande. Det görs genom att använda befintliga dokument, analyser och ramar där det är möjligt. Dess speciella värde är strävan att stärka kommunikationen om kommunal politik på ett lättförståeligt och tillgängligt sätt och därmed bygga stöd och acceptans för ytterligare reformer.

Genom att skapa och testa metoder kommer OZONE-projektet att visa fördelar för lokala politiker och medborgare av god förvaltningssed för kommunerna, regelbunden kommunikation med medborgarna och fortlöpande övervakning av resultaten. Baserat på dessa positiva erfarenheter syftar projektet till att påverka ytterligare borgmästare och politiker på högre nivå så att de tar efter dessa exempel.

Projektets totala budget är 3 360 000 SEK. Sida kommer att bidra med 1 680 000 SEK och Schweiz (SDC) kommer att samfinansiera projektet med lika mycket, 1 680 000 SEK. Sverige tecknar avtal med och delegerar medel till Schweiz, medan Schweiz kommer att ingå avtalet med IREI. Svenska medel kommer att kanaliseras genom Schweiz finansiella strukturer. Schweiz kommer att fungera som en huvudgivare (leaed donor) i detta stöd. Organisation "Institute for Development and European Integration" (IREI), registered in BiH  as a citizen’s association,  has applied to Sida for funding of 1 650 000 SEK  (1,65 SEK) to carry out the project "OZONE – Open and Accountable Municipalities " in Bosnia and Herzegovina during the period May 2021-May 2023. 
The OZONE Project aims to  generate and support the political will for more citizen-centered policy at the level of municipalities. 
The approach is to select motivated newly-elected mayors and provide them and their municipal staff with assessment by experts with governance experience in order to enable the mayors to set a New Policy Programme (NPP) with specific and measurable goals during the first 2 years of their mandate. Mayors and municipalities will be selected based on demonstrated interest, geographic diversity, and potential impact. The contents of each NPP should be consistent with existing local development strategies, but also include internal administrative changes, savings and new practices to strengthen openness and accountability of the municipality vis-à-vis citizens. OZONE Project  will work with each municipality to establish a monitoring system for the level of implementation of each NPP goal. New practices including monitoring and implementation will be implemented through a training programme customized for each municipality. The final Project component is to establish or strengthen communication platforms (phone, social media, apps) for citizen concerns to be easily communicated and responded to in a timely manner, as well as providing frequent and clear updates towards citizens about the progress of the municipality to-wards the established goals. 
OZONE Project complements and builds on existing work regarding municipal development planning and citizen participation. It does so by using existing documents, analyses and frameworks where possible. Its particular value is the effort to strengthen communication regarding municipal policies in an easily-understood and accessible way, thus building constituencies for further reforms.
By creating and testing these practices, the OZONE Project will demonstrate benefits to local politicians and citizens of good governance practices for municipal governments, regular communication with citizens and ongoing monitoring of results. Based on these positive experiences, it aims to create broader impact by additional mayors and higher-level politicians adopting this approach as well as by creating a cohort of promising and successful mayors with new skills and increased motivation.
The intervention’s total budget is SEK 3 360 000 ( 3,36 MSEK). Sweden will contribute in the amount of 1 680 000 SEK (1,68 MSEK) and  the Embassy of Switzerland will  co-finance the project in the equal amount of 1 680 000 SEK (1,68 MSEK).  Sweden will sing the Cooperation Agreement with Switzerland, while Switzerland will enter into contractual obligation with IREI. Swedish funds will be channeled through Switzerland's financial structures. The Embassy of Switzerland will act as a lead donor in this contribution. The OZONE project is built on the assumption that accountability of municipalities should not only be rooted in citizen participation in setting development priorities, but also in improving the experience of citizens when they contact the municipality to address everyday concerns. This is because the number of citizens that interact with the municipality on a daily basis exceeds those that participate in an entire planning process.

OZONEs approach to increasing political will for reform is to focus on two key accountability links. The first is to strengthen the accountability of the municipality to its citizens by two-way communication. By two-way communication we mean first of all creating a system for providing timely and accurate responses to citizen communication with each municipality via phone and social media platforms. Within communication by the municipality towards citizens, the emphasis is on reaching citizens where they are present (including both social and traditional media) in order to break down citizen assumptions that government does not address their everyday needs.

The second accountability link is between the mayor as the highest municipal elected official and the municipal administration. OZONEs approach is built on our analysis that mayors have limited tools to ensure the accountability of these staff towards achieving the results that matter for citizens (e.g. responsiveness, openness and transparency). This is somewhat because incoming mayors inherit a full municipal staff, which can reflect nepotism of previous administrations, but also a disconnect between formal and highly-bureaucratic procedures (for most citizens) and the informal rules (for a selected few) by which municipal administrations frequently function. A final reason is that employment conditions which do not favour younger, motivated and highly-educated staff. This second accountability link will be addressed within Ozone by establishing a performance monitoring system in the form of targets and a system for regular monitoring of progress towards the goals of the measures established in each NPP. 

This impact hypothesis is complementary to other important work to strengthen the accountability of mayors to municipal councils. Mayors are the point of entry for Ozone because of their high level of influence on the day-to-day functioning of the municipality and potential to positively change the atmosphere towards openness and accountability. Although the process of creating an NPP and monitoring the progress towards its implementation is about the policy details, the potential impact is by activating the interests of mayors to the degree that they are supported by citizens for adopting an open and accountable approach.