JOBTOWN in Nagykálló: A City's Alliance for Youth Employment

Q: What is the objective of the Jobtown project?

What is the role of the Hungarian partner city, Nagykálló in the project?

A: JOBTOWN is a European Network of Local Partnerships for the Advancement of Youth Employment and Opportunities. The leader of the partnership is the city of Cesena (IT).

The project seeks solutions for youth unemployment, poor employment as well as for development and maintaining a competitive and sustainable local economy and social model.

The biggest strategic challenge for our city is to reduce the migration of young people to bigger cities and to attract young workers to the city. Unfortunately the population of Nagykálló is steadily declining and ageing, which significantly impairs the long-term prospects of the city. Thus our aim is to work out the basics of an urban policy for young people in which we deal with housing, leisure time as well community building issues. Our overall goal is to involve the local youth as much as possible in the exploration of problems and drafting of local action plan using the community planning and the URBACT method.

Q: Who are the members of the local support group?

What institutions and associations can reach the local young people?

A: The main focus of the project is employment however local organizations also deal with education and training of the youth as it is a very important role. The members of the local support group (LSG) are principals of secondary educational institutions, particularly the leaders of the local vocational school. In addition a partnership was formed with the Employment Centre of Nagykálló who provided valuable information on their exploration of both the problem and the proposed solutions to be worked out.

The involvement of the North Plain Regional Development Agency in the Local Support Groups (LSG), provides us with an enriching partnership, valuable experiences and good practices. In turn we also propose financing measures from the European funds.  We have devoted an important role for the Urbs Novum Urban Development Nonprofit Ltd. also, where local young professionals work. They prepared an integrated urban development strategy 2014-2020 for the city of Nagykálló. 

Last but not least a valuable member of our LSG is Béla Kézy URBACT expert who has important practical experience and helped our operation with a new community planning method.

Q: How does the local government try to help young people?

A: We know that the most important factor keeping the young people in the city is jobs. But we had to admit that in this respect the nearby big city, Nyíregyháza can provide more opportunities, especially for young people with higher education degrees. Therefore, in addition to the Local Action Plan, we launched further measures during the preparation of our urban development strategy drafted as follows:

• support of local community-building programs, entertainment opportunities/leisure activities in order to strengthen local cohesion;

• rental housing program for young people that will create affordable housing options through the utilization of green energy, so that young individuals participating in the program will only go to work in Nyíregyháza;

• creative actions involving young people (e.g.: decoration of the facade of deteriorated buildings), which also strengthens the community and the cohesion. 

Furthermore from 2015 we want to start a scholarship program under which young people living here and studying in higher education institutions can gain work experience at local businesses, as a result we hope that they will be employed on a long term.

Q: How does Nagykálló profit from the URBACT Program?

A: The main result is that a wide range of support group deals with the problem and it has been managed so, to create a live link between the target group, the local government, the intermediary organizations (employment centre, supporting organizations) and the urban development company through community planning method.

Q: What are the main directions of the Local Action Plan?

A: There are twelve actions that will help to achieve the four main objectives of the Action Plan:

• school-job expo, partner search events for young graduates, and the local construction industry cluster will help the coordination of the local labour market;
• traineeship for students, public work program for unemployed, and a self-supporting settlement concept will help the acquisition of work experience;
• support for employment/self-employment is to be achieved by developing entrepreneurship education, social enterprises and the continuation of the self-supporting settlement program;
• mobility will be increased by housing market actions, improvement of public transport opportunities for commuters, and integrated nursing services for children.

Q: How can other European cities profit from the Jobtown project achievements?

What lessons would you share with other cities?

A: It is worth thinking on how much money and effort are made by the local government for instance for the elderly, and in fact how much for the young (16-25 years old) generation. We found a huge difference, while the young generation is facing serious employment, housing and community problems.

The most important lesson is that today a young generation must be actively involved in urban planning processes and a broad range of options and supports must be developed for them.

Involve young people, because they are the future of the city!

Interviewees:

László Török PhD, Project Manager, Nagykálló

Zoltán Juhász, Mayor of Nagykálló

BY  National Dissemination Point, Hungary

Photo Credit Cripin Blackall Flickr

Read more:

JOBTOWN – URBACT network