Assessing Strategic Programs for Sustainable Local Development: A Case Study

In recent years in Italy, public and private sectors have been stimulated by the National Government to cooperate in urban renewal, thanks to public funds committed through competitive procedure. In 1998, the Ministry of Public Works promoted new Programs for Urban Renewal and Sustainable Regional Development (Italian acronyme: Prusst). This kind of program puts together a package of public and private projects to promote economic and sustainable development. The main axes are networked systems, productive centres, urban rehabilitation and environmental preservation. New attention is given to cooperation and negotiation among local authorities and private operators.The research deals with a critical analysis for the evaluation methods used to select the projects to include in the programs, with the aim to propose the Community Impact Evaluation (CIE) as a more appropriate method for their evaluation. CIE takes account of the total costs and benefits for the community involved, with particular attention to the impact of such costs and benefits on the various community sectors.In addition, the authors try to integrate the CIE with other sectoral assessment methods necessary to obtain public funding, such as Social Financial Analysis and Social Impact Assessment. The methodology proposed is finally tested in the program carried out by the towns of Forlì and Forlimpopoli, in the Emilia Romagna region.The purpose is to define an “accounting” matrix capable of emphasizing the advantages for the public and private sector participating in the program and of selecting a set of projects that, in minimizing negative impacts, respond to efficiency, sustainability and distributive equity criteria.