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Bristol City Council
created Jul. 28, 2011
Building a Better Bristol
The problem
The idea
The Challenge: Can Local Government become ‘the platform’ that enables investment to be made locally, rather than just acting as the ‘vending machine’?
The Idea: Just as the Civic State of the 20th Century was defined by taxation and policy so the Civil Realm of the 21st Century will be defined by the quality and breadth of investment as much as the vision and drive of our social entrepreneurs. Public Finance alone is no longer sufficient to allow Councils to deliver on our democratic mandate for local leadership. Bristol’s response is to turn this problem on its head and to create new mechanisms that support co-financing with the local community, turning citizens into genuine stakeholders. Bristol will develop an investment and funding instrument for sustainable prosperity (based on the creative opportunities presented by tools such as Community Land Trusts and Community Interest Companies. This will draw in and capitalize on cash and assets that the city’s communities, individuals and public sector can offer and match, investing in our civil infrastructure and services to individuals and communities. Investors will obtain tangible social impacts and realistic financial returns on their commitments.
The Context: Bristol remains a wealthy yet unequally successful society. It has been in the vanguard in the green, social capital, digital connectivity and inclusion fields and offers a huge range of entrepreneurial talent and a wealth of underexploited capacity to build on and connect up within our region and with the wider world.
The Outputs: The outputs will relate to the following, Local Government creating a platform that facilitates long term co-financing Citizens as investors in the city’s future Sustainable models of investment and growth An inclusive approach A sustained legacy: capacity and co-productivity that meets the needs and harnesses the opportunities of the new economy
What we need
Tags
NESTACC
This innovator has rated their Idea as:
A little tweak
A game changer