1 What were the issues or challenges the project aimed to address?

The project was a response to the need to permanently strengthen the third sector in Warmia and Mazury through professionalization, improved communication with local communities, and especially their specialization and involvement in the processes of creating and applying laws and public policies in particular locally. The need to act to strengthen local democracy and local lawmaking processes, as in many cases local governments fail to deal with a range of issues that are key to citizens. The key problems of recent years were also pandemic – the social sector suffered significantly, could not count on as much financial support as other sectors. Many NGOs suspended their activities, most had financial, personnel problems(NGOs to the pandemic,2020, Klon/Jawor). Another problem was low public knowledge of NGOs, what they do, what role they play, or outright reluctance related, among other things, to the negative narrative carried out in the media.

2 What did the project do?

The main recipients of the project were NGOs and informal groups operating in the Warmian-Masurian Voivodeship (representatives of foundations, associations, informal groups, activists and social activists, etc.). Indirect recipients were residents of the voivodeship and representatives of local governments, who followed the offer and results of the project activities through social media. Activities undertaken in the project included: training, counseling, consultations, training cycles, expertise, mini-projects, community sessions. All of the listed activities were important for the complementarity of the offer to strengthen organizations. The products of the project were: training (328h), consulting (511h), social sessions (27), mini-projects (20), expertise (6).

3 What results did the project achieve and for whom?

In the opinion of the project implementer, the project was successful. The benefit of the activities carried out is the strengthening of more than 337 organizations from the region, and substantive and valuable documents in the form of expert opinions were developed that will serve both organizations and local governments in the future. The importance of the activities undertaken can be seen in the activation of the community, their own activities, among other things, by conducting mini-projects, participation in consultations, organized by JST, participation in the developed documents and the increase in the competence of their representatives both in training and training cycles. The results of the project will have long-term positive consequences, including increased knowledge, greater participation of org. in lawmaking, use of access to public inf.