THE FORUM OF AMBITIOUS CITIES IS ALREADY RUNNING
The meeting was held on Monday (July 4, 2022) at the seat of the Podlaskie Voivodeship Marshal’s Office, which is a partner of the project. The Forum of Ambitious Cities itself is an initiative of Hajnówka, which takes place as part of the project “Hajnówka renewal – Green Transformation”, which is extremely important for the city.
We have committed ourselves to organizing and enabling the functioning of a forum for the exchange of experiences for cities. We want to create a common space for sharing insights. This is especially important at the moment when we are facing challenges related to the new financial perspective for 2021-2027.
The Ambitious Cities Forum is a place to exchange experiences for cities struggling with development problems and losing their socio-economic functions. It is supposed to be a space for joint search for solutions to problems. The relevant agreement was signed on Monday by 14 cities from the Podlaskie Voivodeship.
In a situation when the Białowieża Forest ceased to be a source of raw material from which the entire local industry drew, it was necessary to look for a way to preserve the forest for Poland and the world on the one hand, and for people to live well here, to use the potential of the forest for creating a new tourist offer and more.
This is, among other things, the project “Hajnówka renewal – Green Transformation”, co-financed under the Local Development Program. 212 cities from all over Poland applied for it, and 29 received funding. From the Podlaskie Voivodeship, apart from Hajnówka, Łomża also qualified as a former voivodeship city.
The World City Forum in Katowice, from which I recently returned, was attended by representatives from 155 countries around the world. The subject of the discussion was what to do to make life better in cities. How to create these cities so that the inhabitants have a very large share in what is happening in them? What to do so that these small and medium-sized cities that are losing their functions could develop like large agglomerations? Thanks to this initiative, we will also be able to influence other regions. We are waiting impatiently for its first effects.
The first ACF meeting was held on Monday. After the holidays, more are planned.