First experiences with the new transparency module: “Political organization of the City Council” (2/3)
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Since April 8, the transparency portals have two new modules that make it easier for citizens to improve the view of the political organization of the City Council, as well as the interpretation of indicators of economic management of municipalities.
Focus on the module "Political organization of the City Council", if in the previous post we detailed how the module is shown at the level of main page and detail of the municipal portfolio items and elected positions, in this second entry we will advance in the detailed description of the result for the items “Governing bodies and functions"I"Political / municipal groups”, Where you will be able to appreciate that they also improve substantially.
Module "Political organization of the City Council"
Governing bodies and functions
For the councils that use the transparency portal, the item “Governing bodies and functions” is a structured manual item, that is, it is not automatic but a certain basic structure is proposed to inform it. In practice, most of us have chosen to fill it in manually by putting the descriptions they have considered most appropriate.
This is an example of the item governing bodies and functions filled in with a personalized description by the body, in this case of the City Council of Ribes de Freser:
The item must include all the different governing bodies existing in the City Council (institutional administration), as well as the functions that each of them performs, their composition with the identification of senior officials. In addition, and at the will of the body, the reference of the legal regulations governing each governing body may be incorporated.
Although personalization makes it easier for us to incorporate all the elements indicated manually, the reality is that if we browse different portals we will find countless models of information presentation, often redirects and often repeated information with other items, especially elected officials, who are forced to do various maintenance.
With the new module “Political organization of the Consistory" the information linked to the item Governing bodies and functions it is much clearer and more understandable, taking advantage of the information already introduced by other items.
This is the example ofParets del Vallès City Council, we are already using the new module with some very interesting results:
The new module facilitates the visualization of the set of Governing Bodies, and their consultation by means of a format in “cascade” deployable.
At the operational level, the solution facilitates the incorporation of descriptions, details of the functions, as well as automatically associating the elected positions that are part of it.
For municipalities using the transparency portal, the item "Political / municipal groups" is again a manual item with a structured model that includes the basic elements to comply with Article: 9.1.a) of Law 19/2014, of December 29, on transparency, access to public information and good government (LTC).
Specifically, article 9.1.a) of the LTC indicates that it is necessary to publish on the portal the list of political groups represented in the local body, as well as the most relevant information of these, such as the representatives that make up each group, a brief biography of these, the link to the group's website, blogs, etc.
In the case of transparency portals this obligation has been put into practice in different ways. There are entities that make use of the structured model that we propose, entities that advance with the modality of their own descriptions in a multitude of formats, texts, tables… or entities that redirect the item to the environment of their website.
The new module greatly improves the display possibilities of the item, and its automatic relationship with other items on the portal, such as the "elected positions", linking the data and the display model.
A great example of work on this item is what he has done Roda de Berà City Council:
On a first screen for citizens it is very easy to see the whole set of municipal political groups, identified with logos, and the number of positions held by each of them.
Entering the detailed description of a municipal group of the city council (for example of the municipal group “TRIA”) includes aspects like the contact, information associated to indemnifications or the link to the detail of the file of each elect.
Thus, with this last item we have already completed the tour of all the improvements that can be seen in the different items of political organization of the City Council..
To do this we have had different examples (municipalities of Llagostera, Castellar del Vallès, Castelldefels, Parets del Vallès and Roda de Berà), but we also invite you to visit other major proposals for municipal transparency portals with the new active module such as are theCity Council of Matadepera,City Council of Les Preses or l 'Ascó Town Hall.
In the next entry (3/3) of this new module of "Political Organization of the City Council", we will focus on detailing a good municipal practice in its use.
