The CommEUnity is an initiative driven by Matteo Satta, in collaboration with Major Cities of Europe, to support the collaboration between Cities and Communities with the world and research and innovation. Its main aim is to find common solution for the green and digital transition to fight the ongoing global warming.
Who
The CommEUnity is composed by about 30 members today, mostly cities, local governments and public/no profit stakeholders working with cities in their daily challenges. Some examples are: City of Florence, City of Prato, City of Larissa, City of Turin, City of Ioannina, City of Trikala, City of Issy-les-Moulineaux, City of Zagreb and many more.
The CommEUnity is a closed group of Major Cities of Europe’s members and stakeholders working and/or collaborating with Matteo Satta. Outside of these two groups, the CommEUnity can consider applications only from cities and local governments. If it is your case and want to join, please write us at info@majorcities.eu to become a member.
Vision
Today, especially in Europe, we notice an increasing request to reduce taxes and, consequently, public budgets. This leads to an increasing reduction of specific budgets of Cities, and public authorities in general, which often pay the highest price.
Moreover, in parallel, Cities and local public authorities are requested to have high level investments, not without risks, on innovation and digital transformation. One of the tools used by Cities and public authorities to improve innovation respecting smaller budgets is the use of pilots or, anyway, experimental projects.
Thus, EU framework programs, such as Interreg or Horizon Europe, become more and more important for Cities, as they become a source of funding on one side, but also a tool to have the support from private companies and consultants to improve their innovation processes.
In parallel, the European institutions are giving support and launching many initiatives to support Cities and public authorities, but they are struggling to reach the most of them, particularly on some programs. The main consequence is that big players and the visionary cities are harvesting most of the projects, while many cities are still struggling in being part of the process.
The CommEUnity is a community of Cities, public authorities and their stakeholders to share around their innovation and EU projects, particularly around (a) their EU structures and/or strategies, (b) good practices in their innovation projects funded by European programs and (c) funding opportunities.
