The Government of South Australia has launched a $1m online programme called ‘Fund My Community‘. That’s Australian dollars so about £500,000. The initiative is part of its ‘Your Say’ programme, and they have created a video to help promote the idea.
Through Fund My Community, the Government of South Australian is using participatory budgeting to address disadvantage across the state. The trial will see if participatory budgeting provides an easy and efficient alternative to traditional grant decision-making processes and achieves a fair distribution of the funds. But they’ve received nearly 120 eligible applications requesting over $6.5m in funding, so competition will be fierce.
The online platform allows people to post comments, browse the different projects, and decide how they would spend the available money. They have to allocate at least $700,000 from a range of categories to submit their choices, up to the maximum of $1m… to ensure people don’t just vote for one idea.
- Find out more on the Fund My Community website
- Watch the Fund My Community Video on Youtube