Dear Readers,
3 months have passed since our last newsletter at the end of May. At that point, the Covid-19 pandemic was just taking off, many countries were in the middle of lockdown and the number of infected people skyrocketed in many countries. Still most of us did not expect, that the pandemic would hit so hard, in so many countries, that it would turn our lives upside-down and would cause so much hardship to many people on this planet.
Many cities have faced enormous challenges during that time. Cities have tried with all means to build their health facilities and staff up, tried to break infections chains. They had to convince the population on the necessity of new and often very strict regulations, had to look after vulnerable people during lockdown - to name just a few aspects.
Connective Cities has adapted a lot too! Due to the fact, that travelling in order to get together in workshops around the world became completely impossible, the choice was to stop with our activities completely or to adapt them to virtual formats. We have chosen the latter and had made the experience that despite all current challenges, municipal experts were and still are very enthusiastic to exchange - even if just virtually.
Connective Cities has therefore set up a virtual platform and has implemented already four intensive and interactive virtual dialogue and planning events over 3 to 10 days with impressive and very interesting results of the virtual working groups and showcasing many good practice presentations!
We also have started our series on Covid-19 Municipal Response Dialogue with the objective to exchange on lessons learned but also to develop solutions jointly in order to face this crisis. Six virtual events have been already implemented as for example “Pandemic Response in refugee-hosting cities” or “Work in crisis teams and operational planning” to name just two.
The essence is: the Covid-19 pandemic has not stopped the readiness and enthusiasm of urban practitioners to work on the improvement of livelihoods in their cities. Furthermore, Corona has shown, that in challenging times it is even more important to reach out to each other and to work jointly on our common challenges. Connective cities is ready to support you in this process with lots of new - for the time being virtual - exchange and learning events and virtual space to network in all world regions and we are looking very much forward to meeting you there!
Stay safe and healthy!
Best regards,
Your Connective Cities Team
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