There are many reasons why having public access to information about the plans and actions of local authorities is important. Without access to information, it is impossible for citizens to have a say in decisions regarding their cities.

That's why Stanczyk Foundation gathers information on issues that are important to local residents on the przejrzystykrakow.pl portal. Some of the things the website provides access to are:

* Recordings from sessions of the City Council, its committees and district councils,

* Documents related to the daily activity of the City Council,

* Election campaign monitoring information;

The website uses data scraping tools to collect information from websites belonging to the Krakow municipality, business registry, Ministry of Finance and more. The website use an API set up by mojepanstwo.pl, the biggest open data repository in Poland, created by ePa?stwo Foundation in 2012.

The information on the website is often used by other civic initiatives. For example, before the local elections in Krakow, Demagog.org.pl, the biggest fact-checking organization in the country, used the website to  conduct research on how well local councillors fulfilled their campaign promises. Video streaming of Council meetings through the website has pushed local authorities to introduce their own streaming service on their website.

On the other hand, the initiative is struggling with issues of funding and sustainability, as the Sta?czyk Foundation only received funding to create and develop the tool.

Website: https://przejrzystykrakow.pl/

Case study date: June 2018