LC 00278

By looking at the the activities, actors and methods/approaches used, this section will provide a better understanding of the the implementation process of the MLS approach. We will look describe the point of departure, describe who was involved (when, why and how) and what key decisive moments there were.

Point of departure of FRM strategies

Figure 2. Initial and desired score to reach per layer in the Denderleeuw pilot (Baseline monitor, 2017)

Stakeholders involved

The primary stakeholders are citizens and companies located in flood-prone zones (as defined by the flood risk maps). In addition, the following stakeholders are identified:

Public actors:

• Municipality of Denderleeuw
• Flemish spatial planning department (Department Omgeving)
• Water management agencies:
  • The Flemish Waterways (De Vlaamse Waterweg)
  • VMM (Flanders Environment Agency)
  • Province of East-Flanders
  • Aquafin
• Public secondary school of Denderleeuw
• Natuurpunt

Citizens:

• The students of the secondary school

Private actors:

• Verbond West-Brabantse Ondernemingen
• Bedrijvencentrum Aalst

Role of key actors

Public actors

• The main accomplishment was to engage the public actors of Denderleeuw into a participation process. This engagement was rather problematic and difficult. Time was needed to evolve the actors’ perception and passive stance into a more interestingly willing approach. A real collaboration is now set (February 2019) with the new alderman of spatial planning and environment have officially stated his interest in collaborating in the project, the departments of mobility and public works as well as the sewer manager and the social housing company showing positive participations. The collaboration will lead at minimum to the development of a Vision Plan for the whole flooding area of the centre of Denderleeuw and at best to an action Plan with specific measures.
• An interesting achievement is the participation of the De Vlaamse Waterweg (The Flemish Waterways). This public actor, responsible of the navigable river management, was not well acquainted with participative procedures, presenting in the past a high reluctance and scepticism to follow this kind of process. The Flemish Waterways were involved in the participation process of Ninove.
• The collaboration with Geraardsbergen started later, in September 2018. Geraardsbergen was originally not part of the project pilot but showed a very positive collaborative stance, probably due to the fact that the city already have taken participative measures with local inhabitants and that it’s more often subject to flooding.
• Schools in Denderleeuw were interested in working with the University of Ghent on the school program. Resulting from the interviews with the teachers, it was clear that the primary teachers considered climate change as being an important societal issue. They also argued that climate change was already present in the teacher’s curriculum but only about subjects related to climate change mitigation (CO₂ reduction measures) and not climate change adaptation. They stated that they learned something about the future challenges but regardless of this honest confession, they argued a change in the primary teachers’ curriculum was not needed. Further workshops were planned in April and May of 2019. For now, the accomplishment of this part of the project is the raise of awareness but additional collaboration should be needed to activate pragmatic reaction.

  Citizens

• 5 community resilience workshops were delivered. The workshops in the fire brigade office and the café ’De Belleman’ were very effective with a high presence and active participation of the inhabitants. One workshop, in Okegem, did not result an active participation
• Awareness-raising brochure ‘Water zonder overlast’, was produced and is continuously distributed (both for flood prone citizens and the wider community).
• The preparedness manual is in progress, it is made by flood-prone citizens for newcomers to the area, in cooperation with the fire brigade.
• The incorporation of flood risk / water issues into neighbourhood information networks could take place in the upcoming months. However, it is entirely dependent on the head of the police department’s willingness.
• The school program has let to the raise of awareness amongst children of the needs for climate change adaptation measures. Further information sessions with teachers’ and parents were organised in June and in the first semester of the year 2019-2020.

Main activities

At the start of the project, the Province of East Flanders and the UGhent developed a participation strategy including a stakeholder analysis whom they wanted to reach, and how to involve them. There were three target groups: flood-prone citizens (1), wider community (2) and local governments (3).

1.       Flood prone citizens  

Community resilience workshops were organised as a mean to involve flood-prone citizens, to raise awareness, activate them, change their attitude towards what they can do themselves, find citizens that are interested to become part of working groups to work on a specific product / topic.

First, door-to-door visits were done with flood-prone citizens in Denderleeuw:

• To get a good idea of the profile of the people and spark their interest in participating in the community resilience workshop
• Further community resilience workshops did not take place due  to a lack of authorization from the local authorities. Denderleeuw was thus put on the side and the community resilience workshops were exclusively organised in Ninove.

2.       Wider community

 A school program was developed by the UGhent for children from 10 to 18 years old to raise awareness. Two schools were contacted in Denderleeuw in June 2018, one primary and one secondary school. The program was conducted in the primary school in October 2018 and the program for the secondary took place in April and May, 2019. Further information sessions with teachers and parents were organised in June and in the first semester of the year 2019-2020.

3.       Local authorities

 In the beginning of the pilot, contacts were established with several local governments (Ninove, Denderleeuw, Liedekerke). The FRAMES project was presented to find out who is interested in participating, where to carry out the community resilience workshops, and so on. The Province stayed away from asking too much engagement of the local governments, because they knew that they only have limited capacities. As a result, local governments have now a rather passive attitude in the FRAMES pilot. 

Referenties

• Transnational Monitor and Evaluation report FRAMES, FRAMES, FRAMES, 8 juni 2020.
• Monitoring survey 13 Denderleeuw, Mees, H. and B. Tempels, 9 januari 2019.