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Urban

Planning

  • Long term rental preference

    • tax penalties for landlords that rent out property less than 30 days at once

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  • Inherent sustainability for new buildings

    • Heavy penalty for buildings that do not incorporate either solar panels, vertical gardens or a green roof

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  • Intercity public transport ticket transferability

    • Monthly and annual public transport passes with extended validity use of public transport in other towns up to 3 days

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  • Green spaces and tress

    • Unused and certified green spaces and fields can be sponsored and leased by citizens, giving them rights to plant and harvest but also obligates to proper caretaking

    • Every construction project that removes trees has to plant an equal or greater amount of trees on the property 

    • Penalties for unauthorized destruction of trees or rootage by construction companies (upkeep cost of tree can be 20,000€)

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  • Promotion of affordable living

    • Non-profit building projects and housing associations receive subsidies while for-profit projects have to pay taxes based on the sales-value and/or projected rental price, both only in the city area, not in the metropolitan area

Environment

  • Provision of potable water

    • All public and commercial establishments have to give out tap water on request

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  • Receptacle deposit

    • Increase deposit on all bottles and cans

    • Establish deposit stations on well-frequented public spaces and indicate next one via app or signs

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  • Domestic water and sun usage

    • Subsidies to purchase rain water capture devices, where grey water is used domestically

    • Rental tax cuts for landlords that sell their tenants electricity from their solar roofs

    • Rental tax cuts for landlords that employ rain water capture devices with subsequent grey water use

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  • Food waste

    • High penalty for commercial food waste on landfill, establish network of valorization, either through food banks or biogas

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  • Eco labels

    • Mandatory for all processed and packaged grocery items as well as standardized restaurant dishes

    • Include the overall life-cycle CO2 emissions, a defined equivalent for easier understanding (household examples, e.g. washing clothes), the water footprint as well as a traffic light sustainability indicator (a product of emissions, fair trade practices, farming practices and regionality)

Education

  • New classes for the challenges of the 21st century

    • Digital and internet competence

    • Economy, tax system and personal finance

    • Empathy and constructive togetherness

    • History of science, sustainability and resource awareness

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  • Virtual classroom offerings

    • Voluntary interest groups for grades 5-13 offered by the school (e.g. astrophysics or international politics)

    • Advancing education classes for unemployed people paid by job centres (e.g. on accounting or production planning)

    • Professional and personal development classes by the chamber of commerce or adult education centres 

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  • Reorganization of teaching style

    • Incorporating video lectures (e.g. Khan Academy) in learning process, acquisition of knowledge becomes the homework while at school the material is discussed (e.g. history) or practiced (e.g. maths)

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  • Practical experience as part of the curriculum

    • Full day excursions into nature (e.g. a forest as part of biology), industry (e.g. a chemical plant for physics or chemistry)

    • Introduction of school gardens with ~1 hr/week of maintenance by the pupils, collective harvesting, processing, cooking and eating of fruits and vegetable

    • Introduction of case study projects as part of different science classes, with required group work and individual contributions
       

  • Promotion of early student and school internships

    • Employee hours spent to supervise interns can be tax deducted as donations & no salary tax to be paid for twice the time (early internships shown to increase motivation, career awareness and reduce disadvantages experiences by socio-economically challenged individuals)
       

  • Life-long learning

    • 5% of employee time may be spent for related professional advancement courses within a company or offered by accredited institutions (~2-3 weeks, against shortage of skilled workers)

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  • Socio-professional reintegration

    • The criminal records of ex-prisoners that have finished their probation period should not be disclosed towards future employers and should retain all their citizen’s rights (e.g. voting)

    • Judges to never have to sentence a certain minimum for any kind of crime

Citizen contribution

  • Fourth pillar of power

    • Flat fee for investigative journalism, independent of government, teaching in school about importance

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  • Transparency of lobbyism

    • Full disclosure of all lobbyist activity from state level upwards, including names of people, affiliation, financial contributions and non-financial contributions (e.g. dinner invitations)

    • A public register is to be held for donations of companies towards societies, clubs etc. and every entity that acts as policy advisor (e.g. think-tanks) has to reveal the corporate backgrounds within their board or members list

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  • International corporate responsibility

    • Court for international corporative law breach with every nation that engages in global trade to commit to participation (e.g. tax evasion in multiple countries)

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  • Citizens committees 

    • Establishment of citizens committees for every communal civil service (including electricity, water, gas, green spaces, public transport, museums, libraries, universities, schools, hospitals, sports grounds)

    • Interested local citizens can sign up to a maximum of two and committee has a say in decisions regarding spending and development of the services - similar to the codetermination in companies with the works council

    • Meetings are to be held every 3-6 months with presentation by the civil servants, an open microphone session and democratic majority vote on outstanding decisions, some decisions and discussions can be carried out on the internet
       

  • Political participation and promotion of democracy

    • Local and international party candidates to be open to public as job listings, e.g. a EU-member of parliament position for people with Erasmus experience having lived in different countries or a mayor with a higher degree in administration (to increase political participation of public and introduce discourse from outside)

    • Pre-elections for general elections to be open for a small fee to public individuals that are not members of other parties (to increase public participation in politics)

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  • Prevention of excessive unilateral power in political parties

    • Development of political direction and policy for topical content within a party through special committees consisting of 50% party members and 50% subject experts from industry, administration, non-profit sector or academia (e.g. digitization panel, environmental regulation panel, innovation strategy)

    • Any party leadership level to consist of 1/3 of party members previously not having had a public mandate (e.g. member of parliament) to foster inclusion of novel ideas and breakthrough of old bull practices

© 2017 by Till Weidner

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