We are proud to be an URBACT Good Practice city !

The city of Athienou was recognised as a European Good Practice for the work done in the field of Volunteerism.The “URBACT Good Practice” label was received following a successful call for proposals and an intense selection process.

The Athienou Municipal Council of Volunteering (MCV) provides for the basic needs of people facing poverty and social isolation. Volunteering is the tool used to connect people and services. Evolving since 1970, there are currently four programs: caring for the elderly, community help and entertainment, nursery care, and social welfare support. These activities interconnect different generations, and provide direct and concrete help to those most in need.The duty of the MCV is to understand, and offer solutions, to the social problems within the municipality and the MCV is a good example of social integration. The basic element for the success is basically active people with a strong sense of belonging, and the excitement of being generous within the boundaries of their everyday life. Over the years, this element alone has created an entity with a higher multilevel organizational structure.

Last year, URBACT launched a call for contributions to cities throughout Europe. Why? To collect sustainable and integrated solutions to the current challenges faced by European cities. The aim: share them and spread them throughout Europe. Thanks to this call, 219 European cities were able to propose their contribution concerning different topics of integrated urban development: from inclusion to governance, and from economy to digital transitions and environmental change. Among these 270 proposals, URBACT was able to select 97 Good Practices coming from cities. Our city is one of them!

URBACT has defined ‘Good Practice’ as a practice that has been proven to work well by ensuring desired results, and could be recommended as a model. The practice also needs to be developed in a participative way, involving all the relevant actors on the ground.It is a successful experience, which has been tested and validated, and deserves to be shared so that a greater number of cities can adopt it. All the good practices labelled by URBACT have provided sufficient evidence of meeting objectives, and indicated the key success criteria for transfer to another city. All selected Good Practices can be consulted on the dedicatedURBACT website: www.urbactgoodpractices.eu

All URBACT Good Practice cities were featured at a showcase event in Tallinn,the URBACT City Festival, between 3 and 5 October of this year. It was an opportunity for our city to promote its work and increase our visibility in the European arena.More than 450 urban professionals from all over Europe joined.Furthermore, our city can become an advocate for change, contributing in URBACT events and publications and to make a real contribution to the Urban Agenda for European Union

• • To know all about our Good Practice, check out the URBACTdedicated website: www.urbactgoodpractices.eu