This article was written by Atanas Sirekov, director for IT in Burgas Municipality, Bulgaria.

For any public servant, working with citizens requires a lot of responsibility and accountability.

There are several challenges. For one, citizens and their organisations often have little information about the real functions and role of local government.

They are also often not well acquainted with the letter of the law, especially when it comes to their obligations and what they are allowed to do. For example, last year, we had a case where a local citizen organisation petitioned my municipality to set up video surveillance on some critical places.

This was very useful, not least because the pressure from these citizens forced the administration to allocate necessary funding and to make the project a reality.

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However, another wish from the same organisation was to have public streaming from the cameras, with the idea that their members and other citizens could look out for possible crimes and call the police.

In this case, the members of the organisation did not realise that this would actually be illegal as this data is personal and only for public safety issues.

Digital citizens

Delivering online services to the public is also an important topic. Irrespective of the kind of services – online forms, free Wi-Fi points or online streaming cameras – the government should be able to offer them 24/7.

“Citizens often monitor the quality of municipal services better than the administration. While some of these services may seem insignificant for the administration, some citizens may see them as vital to their lives”

Citizens often monitor the quality of municipal services better than the administration. In addition, while some of these services may seem insignificant for the administration, some citizens may see them as vital to their lives.

Sometimes citizens ask for services or propose ideas to local government that are impossible to realise without support from the national government. This is the case with certain e-services that can be useful for citizens and local businesses alike.

A local government may offer a full set of e-services, but what is their use, if, for example, the state administration or the court does not work with electronic documents?

In our municipality, we deliver 34 different e-services – from marriage certificates to proofs of address – and ensure access to them via a variety of legally accepted electronic identities. Nevertheless, in 2018, these services were only used 56 times in total.

From January to October 2019, similarly, these e-services have only been accessed 48 times – in an area of more than 200,000 people.

The use of e-services is closely connected to citizens’ trust in institutions and internet security. Citizens measure their trust in public administration by its legal image and transparency. Governments earn public trust through efficiency, internal and external appeal and impact procedures.

An app won’t solve your problems

A new way for governments to appeal to citizens and create impact are through mobile apps that can send local government information about different problems in the daily life of the city: pollution, damaged street surfaces, wrong parking, etc.

Most of these apps need some sort of registration, but not all require phone numbers or require users to give their real name. Therefore, some users may choose to remain anonymous. But, in general, administrations do not answer anonymous messages.

For this reason, some citizens might be disappointed, because they don’t receive an answer from their counterparts in government. Apps might be useful for citizens, but may also diminish confidence in the local government.

In addition, some mobile applications are used to satisfy political or business interests. The developers often add a function, allowing users to “support” (vote for the importance of) a certain proposal advocated through the app.

The difficulty is that, in my experience of working in local government, the problems that are brought to the fore in this way are often built on misleading or factually wrong foundations. Nevertheless, the government’s email address is flooded with complaints, and administrations waste resources on investigating them and answering citizens.

Another problem is that politicians are often tempted to point citizens in the direction of attractive apps without having adequately prepared the administration they manage to address the problems citizens identify. The result is a city map with many unsolved problems, seen by all citizens.

A new relationship

In countries with a strong centralised government, the synchronisation between local and central government and citizens is deeply needed, but nearly impossible.

“The flow of information from top to bottom is stronger than it is from the bottom to the top. It is easier for elected officials to communicate to citizens than it is the other way around”

The flow of information from top to bottom is stronger than it is from the bottom to the top. It is easier for elected officials to communicate to citizens than it is the other way around.

In spite of citizen engagement and similar activities, some useful ideas and proposals from citizens and their organisations might not reach the right person or be acted upon. This could be one reason citizens feel disappointed and discouraged in their efforts to engage with government.

Generally, the lesson I’ve learned from working with citizen engagement is that government should have transparent and clearly regulated relationships with citizens. For example, government should provide citizens with more information about their obligations and rights.

We who work in government must be prepared mentally and technologically. The role of government is to propose ideas and decisions to citizens that are legally compliant and satisfactory for all involved parties. This is one of the ways to realise good governance.

Especially in my field of work, citizen engagement cannot help the protection of personal and official data kept in the organisation. In a local government it is difficult to draw the line between official and public data. On one side we strive to be open and transparent, but on the other hand we have to observe the law.

In any case, the aims of every modern city administration should be to deliver accessible services any time, anywhere, and provide an efficient working administration that can satisfy citizens.

— Atanas Sirekov

Picture credit: Benedikt Geyer on Unsplash