PORTO ALEGRE. Municipal Profile. Urban Context. Why this Case Study is Important BRAZIL

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1 Cities Alliance A typical coastal city skyline in Brazil. PORTO ALEGRE BRAZIL Municipal Profile Porto Alegre, Brazil, has a population of 1.3 million, and a land area of 497 square kilometres. The Gross National Income per capita is US$3,090 (2004). Key economic areas Urban management approach Environment entry point Services: 64 percent; Commerce: 33 percent; Industry: 3 percent. Integrated urban management, participatory budgeting Integrated environmental management, citizen participation, public environmental management programmes Why this Case Study is Important The Porto Alegre case study demonstrates how a change in ruling regime and a move towards decentralisation can greatly strengthen citizen participation in urban governance. 14 It also shows how participation linked to the allocation of resources can change investment in the city. Urban Context Porto Alegre, the largest city in southern Brazil, was founded in The city sits on the banks of Lake Guaiba, and has a very hilly topography. The lake hosts a unique ecosystem, with the city environs itself home to 28 percent of the native flora of Rio Grande do Sol, over 9,000 species. Fauna is also highly diversified. With extensive 14 This case study is taken from Celina Souza s article Participatory budgeting in Brazilian cities: limits and possibilities in building democratic institutions, Environment & Urbanization, Vol 13, No 1, April 2001, and from Rualdo Menegat s paper, Participatory democracy and sustainable development: integrated urban environmental management in Porto Alegre, Brazil, Environment & Urbanization, Vol 14, No 2, October

2 lake and river coastlines, the city is an important economic and cultural centre in Brazil. Urban Management Approach Porto Alegre uses an integrated urban management approach that focuses heavily on citizen involvement. Case Study Citizen involvement in administration has been on the increase in Brazil since the 1970s. Even under the former military regime, a small number of municipalities governed by a segment of the then MDB (Brazilian Democratic Movement) adopted participatory policies as a way of putting pressure on federal and state levels controlled by the military. Participatory budgeting, in which citizens take part in the budgetary decision-making process, was first tested in the 1980s, with limited success. In 1988, the Brazilian Constitution changed, allowing many municipalities to improve their financial situation. This gave an additional boost to the concept of participatory budgeting, which was further strengthened in Porto Alegre in 1989, the year after the Workers Party (PT) took power. Initially, participatory budgeting was slow to take off in Porto Alegre. Financial resources were lacking, the government structure was disorganised and the poor were not mobilised. Where civic organisations existed, they had a history of confrontation with the government, or they were dominated by clientelism. In Porto Alegre, the local government dealt with this problem by contracting community organisers to positions within the administration. Participatory Budgeting representatives would visit unmobilised Kessler Images.de/Still Pictures Election fever in Porto Alegre. neighbourhoods, looking for new leaders and spreading information about PB. The continuous dialogue with community organisations ensured that the process soon based itself in elements of reality and not in theoretical orientations, enlarging its chances of success. 15 Porto Alegre s PB programme is based on district and thematic plenary assemblies which gather in different parts of the city to participate in the budget-writing process. Additional preparatory meetings on a smaller scale also take place. During the first round of assemblies, local government officials present the audience with general 15 Navarro 1996, p. 9 Case Studies 111

3 information about the city budget. Neighbourhood meetings are then held, in which residents draw up their list of priorities for infrastructure investment. In the second round of assemblies, each district elects two representatives and two alternates to the city-wide municipal budget council. Negotiations then take place between the delegates of the various district budget fora to create district-wide priority lists of infrastructure projects in several investment categories. The municipal budget council decides how funds will be distributed for each priority among districts, and each district quota is applied following the priority list of the district. Spending is monitored year-round by the municipal budget council and the district budget fora, and regular discussions are held with local government personnel on general service provisions. The budget council is responsible for overseeing the plans of each city agency. In Porto Alegre, citizens have chosen to allocate resources mainly for street paving, sewerage, housing and community equipment. Interestingly, PB has shown that what administration thinks will be a priority for citizens is not always what citizens themselves prioritise. In the first year of PB in Porto Alegre, the administration expected that the priority issue for the poor would be public transport. In fact, what the people voted for in the PB process was water supply and sewerage. Following the success of citizen involvement in budgetary decision-making, it became clear that a purely physical planning model, operating in isolation from key actors, was not compatible with participatory democracy. The PB process was restructured in 1994; sectoral public assemblies were introduced to give citizens the opportunity to discuss specific issues relevant to the city and discussion forums were set up around five sectoral themes: Urban planning and development, sub-divided into environment and sanitation, and city planning and housing; Traffic management and public transport; Health and social welfare; Education, culture and recreation; and, Economic development and taxation. Significant changes were made to the city s culture of urban management, giving extra attention to issues that affected the city as a whole. A series of city conferences, bringing together representatives from civil society, was launched in The first, Porto Alegre: City of Democracy asked, What kind of city do we want for the future? The policy recommendations which came out of this conference advised that the future Porto Alegre should practise democratic and decentralised urban management, and combat inequality and social exclusion. The city should also promote high standards of living and environmental quality, be culturally rich and diverse, attractive and competitive, and should seek to establish partnerships between the public and private sectors. It should adopt effective financial strategies, and assume its responsibility as the focal point of the metropolitan area. In 1995, the second city conference, Porto Alegre: City for All debated the reformulation of the urban development master plan, which now included environmental issues. The conference produced a set of resolutions that formed the basis of the new urban and environmental development master plan, which was approved 112

4 by the city councillors in 1999 following lengthy discussions. The third city conference in 2000, Building the City of the Future sought to synthesise the city s social and strategic policies, and coincided with the four-yearly planning exercise which, until then, had been undertaken only by municipal planners and technical staff. For the first time, the 2000 plan involved the general public in setting targets for the next long term. Programme for the management of green areas; Urban tree planting; Oil pollution control in the service sector programme; Industrial water pollution control programme; Atmospheric pollution control programme; Integrated solid waste management; Waste collection and recycling programmes; Waste disposal programmes. Environment Entry Point Porto Alegre has instituted a unique system of integrated environmental management. The system is based on citizen participation; public environmental management programmes; comprehensive knowledge of Porto Alegre s natural and built environments; and environmental education. Results Porto Alegre has the highest standard of living and the highest life expectancy of any Brazilian city. Virtually all its people have water piped to their homes and most have good-quality sanitation and drainage. The garbage collection system reaches virtually all households and has included a separate collection of recyclables since 1990; other programmes enforce industrial pollution control (including special provision in garages and petrol stations), keep down polluting motor vehicle emissions and ensure the re-utilisation of organic wastes from parks and restaurants. The city has 14 square metres of green space per person and a million trees along its streets. Among the many environmental outputs visible in Porto Alegre are: Porto Alegre published the Environmental Atlas of Porto Alegre in This was created with the express intention of building citizen capacities to participate in urban and environmental management in a meaningful way. In order for citizens to make informed decisions, they need adequate information and knowledge about the natural and built environments. Following the publication of the Atlas, an environmental education programme was also set up. Lessons Learned Participatory budgeting has increased government transparency while discouraging negotiations based on vested interests. It encourages increased accountability on the part of local government, which has responded with better public information and with satisfaction surveys. Increased citizen participation in this area resulted in a far greater citizen participation in other areas, notably in integrated environmental management. Replicability The Porto Alegre experience is specific to Porto Alegre, but it demonstrates how changes in citi- Case Studies 113

5 zen participation in one area can have important spill-over effects in other areas. Porto Alegre s experiences with political and citizen commitment is a very useful learning resource for other municipalities. Key Contact 114