Prototype Introduction: We.Budget An open source platform for the visualisation of local governments’ budgets to increase transparency and involve citizens in budget planning. Prototype description Transparency in local budgeting is of key relevance in the framework of the European political dimension because large amounts of EU funds are spent locally. Furthermore, an important political issue concerning local budgets is the effectiveness of the local administration in absorbing and using EU funds properly. Decreasing the gap between citizens and public administration by engaging citizens in monitoring local budgets would increase transparency and prevent misuse of the funds. Creative IT solutions can strengthen local participation and democratic processes in cooperation with committed local governments. The WeBudget prototype intents to broaden the ways citizens can interact with their municipalities. CitizensLab members design a tool that helps local governments to publish their budgets in an understandable and citizen-oriented way. The project intents to fight relevant EU problems such as lack of fiscal knowledge and inertness on direct public participation in fiscal policies, insufficient participatory mechanisms in decision-making, lack of public authorities’ responsiveness towards citizens and lack of political accountability often associated with high levels of corruption. Experimentation in this field provides the possibility to spread successful stories across Europe to foster further engagement in different countries. Aims of the prototype • to design and implement an embeddable open source platform for the visualisation of local governments’ budgets that could guide users towards forms of participatory budgeting; • to influence local governments to become more transparent and apply creative methods of involving citizens in the budget processes; • to raise citizens awareness about budget cycles and the importance of their direct involvement in the debate on how the money is spent, which is the first step to create the community they want. Target Group Local governments and public administration, local citizens, local press, local NGOs Team Ale Gonzalez, wwb.cc Branko Stanic, Institute of Public Finance, Croatia Iva Cukic, Collective Ministry of Space Francesco Saija, Parliament Watch Italia Sandor Lederer, K-Monitor Association Serban Oncescu, Asociatia Civicus Romania Argyro Barata, FEAST Greece Ildikó Simon, Cromo Foundation Budget: 4.780€