AC Projects
Assessment of the conditions of the population in 14 departments in Colombia, 2008<
With funding from the Presidential Agency for Social Action and International Cooperation (Social Action), the International Organization for Migration (IOM - Mission in Colombia) and the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), ASSENDA SA, together with the AC Colombia, the Union Temporal Colombia Sensible was formed "assess the conditions of the displaced people in 14 departments in Colombia, by providing specialized services in home visits for the assessment and determination of conditions of self-support and humanitarian care needs of people in displacement condition.
The project was implemented in 2008 in the departments of :Valle del Cauca, Cauca, Nariño, Putumayo, Caquetá, Risaralda, Quindío, Caldas, Tolima, Cundinamarca, Meta, Boyacá and Casanare, through the development of 4 phases of implementation:
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Preparation: it includes aspects such as training and forming of the work team, the understanding of the tools to be used in visits to displaced persons' homes and the adaptation of these products to technological environments as well as planning of field work.
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Approach to the territory and sensitization of local authorities: This phase is designed to perform the analysis of safety conditions at the local level, and the contact with local authorities.
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Data collection in households: This phase is to develop fieldwork by conducting home visits, observation of environment, analysis and reporting of consolidated information for each visit.
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Analysis and consolidation of information by region: This phase consolidates and analyzes the information collected for the purpose of identifying departmental and regional trends regarding the causes of displacement, emergency humanitarian assistance, need to extend aid and social and economic conditions with a view to stabilizing displaced families.
As a result of the intervention process, it was possible to provide technical elements to determine the conditions of the people enrolled in the National Register of Displaced Persons and in process of evaluation; to obtain evidence to determine the viability of the grant component of humanitarian aid; to understand the causes of displacement and the generation of social and economic conditions towards the stabilization of displaced families; and to ensure the efficiency and effectiveness in the allocation of humanitarian aid to displaced families. Approximately 25 thousand home visits were made to displaced people registered in the RUP of each department selected for the study.
Operation of the Local System for Youth in Teusaquillo 2007-2008
On the one hand, Law 375 defined the local youth system as "the set of institutions, organizations, entities and individuals that do work with youth and pro-youth."
Teusaquillo, by Agreement 002 of September 2004, adopted the Development Plan 2005-2008 which identified the need to strengthen and promote policies, authorities, strategies and programs for youth; by providing mechanisms, scenarios and opportunities to ensure the exercise of their rights, their participation, recognition of diversity and raising their capacities as political subjects, in carrying out their life projects.
On the other hand, through Local Agreement 003 of June 15 of 2007, the Teusaquillo Local Management Board (JAL, in Spanish) legally established the Local System for Youth as the space of interaction in which all public, private and social entities, and youngsters of the locality, through articulated processes of coordination, dialogue, planning, management, monitoring and evaluation. These processes shall tend to the integral realization of the public policy for youth in Bogotá 2006 - 2016, and the inclusion of civil and political rights of young people in Teusaquillo.
In accordance with the foregoing, AC-Colombia developed a process of support and advice to the Mayor of Teusaquillo for the implementation of the Local System of Youth with the aim of achieving social empowerment of youths in the locality.
This project developed the following strategies:
1. Communicational, designed to make the call for proposals, management, promotion, dissemination and information on services offered by local young people, through public presentations, activities, meetings, socialization, the design of an action plan for marketing, social and institutional management, as well the dissemination through the website www.slj-teusaquillo.info.
2. Attention, aimed at strengthening and upgrading of public and private institutional coverage for local youths.
3.Training in and Promoting of leadership skills, designed to strengthen youth participation in local affairs and to promote local their impact on development.
4. Internal organization and support, considering existing agreements, which aims to strengthen opportunities for youth participation and youth advocacy from a process of consultation and consensus-making for the structuring and internal functioning of the Local System for Youth.
Read morewww.slj-teusaquillo.info
Promotion of the Law on Children and Adolescents 2007-2008
In the framework of the Project for the Strengthening of the Local System for Youth in Teusaquillo, AC-Colombia promoted and disseminated the new Code for Children and Adolescents (Law 1098 of 2006).
The project included about 1,225 members of the education community, including teachers and students of public and private schools in Teusaquillo.
The promotion and dissemination of the Code for Children and Adolescents emphasized: the integral protection of children and adolescents; the system of criminal responsibility for adolescents and special procedures when they are victims of crime; the National Family Welfare System; and policies of inspection, surveillance and control.
Civil network for the attention to the displaced and vulnerable population, 2007
In partnership with the Luna Roja Association and the financing of the Mayor of Bogotá, AC-Colombia leads the creation of the Network for the attention to the displaced and vulnerable population in the town of Rafael Uribe Uribe in Bogotá.
The project cared directly for 220 people, receiving counseling services and information, training and networking through the support of other NGOs working with people in situation of displacement in Barrio San Jose, Quiroga, Olaya, Bosques de San Carlos, Gustavo Restrepo, Bravo Páez, Country, Inglés, Centenario y El Libertador, as well as in those neighborhoods located in the UPZ 36 San Jose and UPZ 39 Quiroga.
The project:
- Diagnosed and geo-referenced the displacement situation in the town of Rafael Uribe Uribe.
- Trained social organizations, community leaders and NGOs who work with people in situation of displacement.
- Created the Civil Network for the attention of population in situation of displacement
Pie de foto: Instalación del Comité Local de Rafael Uribe Uribe para la Atención Integral de la Población en situación de desplazamiento por la violencia.
More women, more democracy: New ideas for the 2007 elections.
This project included the implementation of public deliberative forums that brought together major academics, the public and private sectors, political parties, the media and social and community sectors in the cities of Ibagué, Montería, Pereira, Tunja, Villavicencio. It also included the publishing of “More women, More democracy: an imaginary reading of political participation and gender from electoral results in 5 departments in Colombia”.
The results of the elections in October 28th 2007 confirm the initial assumptions that led to this initiative. Grounds of institutional, individual and culture reasons seem to explain the low political participation of women in Colombia. In regards to institutional grounds, despite the existence of a regulatory framework still lack political will to encourage it. This is evidenced by the low channeling of interests and expectations of women's political participation by political parties, and also by the low profile given to government programs to promote political participation with gender equity.
As for individual grounds, there is a sense of low political efficacy on the part of women and a lack of interest in these issues, coupled with ignorance of their rights and duties. Finally, the discrediting of political activity as a “clientelista” activity (patronage). The fact that its role has been assigned to men has determined the low political representation of women in elected office.
Strengthening mechanisms for alternative dispute resolution in Engativá 2007
Co-financed by the Mayor of Bogotá, AC-Colombia, developed the project "Enhancement of Alternative Dispute Resolution for the purpose of disseminating community justice and the importance of knowing alternative mechanisms for resolving conflicts, the people that guide this work and the places to turn to if you need guidance.
This project was developed in the town of Engativá in Bogotá, through recreational-educational workshops aimed at young people, children, men, women, adults and older adults in the neighborhoods of the town.
Through activities such as the Film Forum, storytelling, puppet shows and plays, the Project allowed locals to reflect on ways to resolve conflicts and existing mechanisms for non-violent solution, the tools and bodies for the development of community justice, the focal points for conflict prevention and the role of volunteer coexistence actors: the mediator in fairness, the conciliator, and the peace judge.
Promotion of social control by the educational community of the investment of resources to subsidize the nutritional support component to Learn Food Plan in 8 municipalities in the Boyacá Department 2005-2006
The Governor of Boyacá established among its priorities "to help improve food security and the nutritional situation in Boyacá" by implementing the Food for Learning Plan (PAPA, in Spanish) aimed at ensuring the provision of rations for breakfast or lunch by hiring Parental Associations of school canteens and private operators in 123 municipalities of the department.
Despite institutional efforts to reach a timely and effective response to poor population (levels 1 and 2 of SISBEN), there still are shortcomings in targeting beneficiaries, quality, timeliness and coverage in the supply of rations, affecting the adequate nutrition of students, which has an adverse effect on the educational process and performance. While the model of operation for the Plan establishes the institutional controls applicable to the procurement process and standards of quality --through a process of control and supervision-- it must stimulate the active participation of beneficiary communities to articulate the institutional and social work at a departmental and municipal levels, in order to promote control mechanisms to ensure transparent management of resources in targeting, quality, timing and destination of supplies to contribute to a better development of children and youth, in its first years of schooling.
This project created a model applicable to the 123 municipalities in the department from the “Promotion of social control by the educational community of the investment of resources to subsidize the nutritional support component to Learn Food Plan in 8 municipalities in the Boyacá Department” which would monitor the targeting of beneficiaries, quality and coverage of rations delivered to the people of preschool up to seventh grade in urban areas and reaching up to eleventh grade in the rural area in order to ensure the proper investment of resources by applying the methodology of budgetary social control of the Nutritional Support component of the Food for Learning Plan in the municipalities of Chiscas, Chita, Guateque, Jenesano, La Uvita, Muzo, Sogamoso, and Villa de Leyva in Boyacá.
Systematization of Citizen Participation in the fight against corruption in Honduras 2005
This project of institutional redesign of the High Court of Auditors of the Republic of Honduras was designed to: strengthen the technical, operational and functional structures of the Directorate for Citizen Participation; create and operate a computer system for receiving, processing and evaluation citizen complaints; and to promote citizen participation and the training of human resources and social institutions as part of institutional strengthening project financed by the World Bank.
In this sense, the specific objectives of the Project focused on:
Pie de fotos:
- To redesign the technical, operational and functional structures of the Bureau of Citizen Participation of the High Court of Auditors of the Republic of Honduras.
- To design a computer system for timely attention to citizen complaints.
- To design a computer system for data management of social organizations.
- To design a training strategy and training for public officials and social organizations.
- To formulate a system for the assessment of the performance of officials at the Directorate for Citizen Participation.
- To create teaching materials for the promotion and dissemination of practical tools for social control of public management.
Institutional Action and Social Control by Youth in the Investment in Health of Public Resources 2004-2005
The Colombian Social Security in Health System is composed by the contributory and the subsidized systems. The latter has been established to ensure the entry into the system on a fair basis of the poorest and most vulnerable sectors of the Colombian population. In 2004, official figures showed 13'856 927 million citizens in levels 1 and 2 of the Beneficiary Identification System (SISBEN, in Spanish) whom have their health care needs covered. The subsidy for the attention in health of the poor and vulnerable in the country has resources that exceeded, by 2005, 2'825 million pesos, representing about 1.228 million dollars, the largest government investment in health.
The handling and low technical capacity to identify the beneficiaries of the subsidized regime, the poor understanding of the institutional and community stakeholders on how to operate the Social Security System in Health, and, in addition, the low technical and operational capacity of institutions to conduct timely and effective permanent control, have encouraged the improper diversion of resources to generate mistrust and uncertainty in the citizen towards State institutions and those administering the subsidized health regime.
There are several issues underlying each of these factors. Regarding the first, politicization, discretion in implementation, coupled with the lack of training and training of those who completed the SISBEN survey and corruption of the Administrators of the Subsidized Regime, have created serious distortions in the targeting of the beneficiary population. Regarding the second, the excessive and ever-changing regulations and the existence of a specialized and difficult language have impeded the management of institutions and the approach by citizens to access the subsidized system. Finally, the lack of coordination between enforcement agencies coupled with the lack of social control as a real possibility of citizen participation in the budget process, have facilitated the inefficiency of the audit bodies at a national and local level, leading to a misallocation of resources.
In this sense, the project "Institutional Action and Social Control by Youth in the Investment in Health of Public Resources" directed its efforts to monitor the targeting and management of resources to subsidize health care for the poor and vulnerable in 15 provinces of the department of Boyacá and 58 districts of the city of Ibagué, through the development and implementation of a methodology of social control and juvenile institutional action to strengthen transparency in the local allocation of resources.
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