Institutional portal - Municipality of Milan

The award will be awarded in June in Montreal for the civic crowdfunding project

Milan, 23 May 2019 – The civic crowdfunding project of the Municipality of Milan will be awarded in Montreal as the best initiative aimed at improving urban well-being. The Lombardy capital is the winner of the title of Wellbeing city 2019, a prestigious international recognition dedicated to the public administrations of cities that place well-being at the center of their policies and urban planning.

Milan was selected as the Wellbeing city 2019 for the civic crowdfunding developed in 2016, which allowed the implementation of 16 different projects born from the will of citizens and focused on their needs, including for example the transformation of an abandoned space into a vegetable garden community and the creation of a cinema inside a hospital. Milan was the first Italian municipal administration to use civic crowdfunding as a tool to co-finance projects and involve citizens in the Administration's decision-making choices.

Over one hundred cities in 27 countries competed for the first edition of the Wellbeing city award. A jury of experts including Arianna Huffington, Aisa Kirabo Kacyira and Daniel Libeskind will judge the cities and their projects. Four cities won in the different competing categories: Santa Monica, USA (Community); Pune, India (Economy and Opportunities); Kigali, Rwanda (Public Health); and Lisbon, Portugal (Sustainable Environment); the award won by Milan places it as an "overall winner" city, winner in all categories.

The motivation for Milan's victory in the words of John Rossant, founder and president of Newcities: "To truly thrive, cities must become ecosystems for well-being through planning, policies and initiatives. The expert jury was pleased to see this ecosystem in action in the city of Milan through the innovative civic crowdfunding project and I hope that other cities can look to this financing approach that puts citizens and their well-being at the center of the decision-making process".

The Wellbeing city award is developed by Newcities in collaboration with the Novartis foundation, the Novartis US foundation and in collaboration with the City of Montreal, Toyota mobility foundation, Transdev and US green building Council.

The recognition will be presented to representatives of the Administration on June 19th during an official ceremony to be held at the Wellbeing cities forum in Montreal.