CRISP: Building on national/regional initiatives, how will community resource and socioeconomic studies give you that ‘individual data’?

CRISP: Building on national/regional initiatives, how will community resource and socioeconomic studies give you that ‘individual data’?

By Cecilia Guerrero

            Tourist communities show socioeconomic inequities and significant gaps in various areas, including access to opportunities as well as benefits from economic development. Evaluating a community to understand its socioeconomic status requires focusing not only on income distribution,  but also on quality of life attributes as well as the opportunities and privileges afforded to people within the community. Data collection provides access to an understanding of poverties both at the human level as well as assets and challenges at the community level. Socioeconomic data allow us to analyze how this information affects human behavior, including the physical and mental health and its consequences for lower educational achievement, poverty and poor health, ultimately affecting our society at large. Inequalities in health distribution, resource distribution, and quality of life indicators are increasing in tourist communities. Data collection helps identify priorities and what needs to be improved. Our Smart Destination Initiative begins with collecting baseline information that informs interventions to address poverty at multiple levels: economic, sociocultural, environmental, infrastructure, and most significantly, human capital.

            The main goal of Smart Destinations (SD) is “to transform a tourist community into a smart destination through the implementation of sustainable development practices based on the use of ICT & Connectivity (internet-intranets), where education is the entry point for the improvement of quality of life, ensuring a constant improvement in sustainable economic, social, environmental development and behavior change (with both guests and locals as stewards of the destinations).  SD is a holistic approach based on the evaluation of human development (poverties) level of the seven capitals as well as community assets, using an intervention toolbox that targets tourism destination communities.

            The proposed toolbox is based on the work of various authors with experience in community development and organizational change: the work of the Taylors, Ontario Healthy Communities Coalition and Asset Based Community Development, Kotter, University of Kansas, the Beyond Chacay Foundation´s theory of transformation, and Mark Reiner´s DP640 Case Study. This toolbox provides ideas, information, community resource and socioeconomic data collection, human development evaluation and new processes that could be included in new or existing community development programs. In addition, local governments are challenged to have a more holistic view on how to approach a community focusing on stakeholders and leadership development. See annex.

            This Smart Destinations CRI is strategically aligned with the toolbox (SP). Each step proposed needs to follow a sequence based on data collection for analysis, evaluations, conclusions and proposals, priorities to consider and commitments required.

1.     The SD baseline Information is about what data we can gather before the first approach to the community. Can we determine what are the challenges and who might benefit, and how?

2.     Immersion Program is about being in the community and identifying possible stakeholders: participant observation makes it possible to determine the poverties, and the foundational, essential and societal services.

3.     The next step is sharing the SD initiative with local leaders with its vision, mission, work and intended goals and outcomes based on their input that in this case is the transformation of a community into a Smart Destination.

4.     An additional challenge throughout is an understanding of the distribution of human poverties/wealth. The SD approach is based on the study of the poverties instead of Maslow´s pyramid.

5.     Once sufficient information has been collected, a baseline can be developed that includes socioeconomic data, vulnerabilities, and community stakeholders with a commitment to change.

6.     SD planning takes into consideration annual governmental development planning for the purpose of alignment and coordination.

7.     An additional step is developing a Green Committee with a focus on smart community initiatives that promote a new brand; this will open the doors for differentiation, competiveness, smartification, and innovative solutions to create and promote the community brand.

8.     If the process manages to engage key stakeholders, clearly identifies goals, and produces the desired outcome, it can be scalable to other communities.

      The SD-CRI helps measure the impact of the toolbox by constantly evaluating the process during the execution phases by answering the following: How well was the initiative planned and implemented? Did those most affected contribute to the planning, implementation and evaluation of the effort? How satisfied are participants with the program?

Outcome measures of the CRI

•    Impact on people´s lives and overall community condition

Methods: to measure and demonstrate change based prototypes:

·      Observing the community

·      Behavioral and culture (values) surveys

·      Interviews with key stakeholders

·      Archival records

·      Governmental documentation and analysis of contribution to the initiative

·      Community-level indicators of impact (examples?)

·      Measuring SD Outcomes

·      The success or failure of this SD program proposal will include

·      Program outputs and deliverables

·      Participation rates, opinions and attendance

·      Changes in behavior

·      Community or system changes (i.e., new programs, policies, and practices)

·      Improvements in community-level indicators related to human development or sumak kawsay

Created and inspired by MDP-640, Case Study. Reiner, 2018.

Annex 1