The document summarizes a project in Varna, Bulgaria called PARK Project that used placemaking to engage the local community and improve Elin Pelin Park. It began with festivals to connect with residents and identify leaders. Volunteers then organized cleanups and installed new facilities. The goal was to empower the community to take ownership and maintain the park through ongoing activities. Placemaking and community engagement tools like social media, addressing different groups' needs, and making residents feel responsible were key to the project's success.

1. PARK Project and
the Pilot Actions of
Power Jump in Varna
The Social Change
and Community
Engagement Aspect

2. When you want to
make a change in your
community, never start
with the change itself.
… or how we are using placemaking as a tool for
community engagement and empoerment.
The story of revival of Elin Pelin Park in the
neglected Hristo Botev neigbourhood of the city
of Varna, Bulgaria.

3. The project closely
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What we had at the beginning:
• Local grassroots organisation in Varna
using alternative sports,street arts and
placemaking as a tool for social inclusion
and empowerment (this is us – Power
Jump)
• Newly formed local community around
the old Elin Pelin Park willing to change
the environment in the park and ready to
be the active part in this process (we also
have the park itself – big future potential,
poor present conditions)
• Local authorities busy improving more
attractive parts of the city (rather
passive, conservative and bureaucratic)

4. Form a workflow perspective nothing new – we
just followed the placemaking steps:
1. Touch –Active Saturday Festival (kick-off the
process and connect with the community)
2. Engage –identifying leaders and different
social groups, initiating meetings, identifying
problems and needs and mapping realistic first
actions to be taken. Active social media
groups created and maintained
3. Action – Openning event for old facilities
rennovation and massive clean-up. A follow-
up for second clean-up and Communication
Signs installation. Mediating and hard working
with local authorities and mass media
4. Celebrate – modern sports facilities installation
and PARK Sports Festival to be organised

5. 1
. Touch 2. Engage
3.
Action 4. Celebrate
(Upcoming)

6. The Community Engagement and Empowerment Tools behind the obvious steps:
Find local leaders and activists,
keep a constant contact with
them and work together. Make
them a focal point of contact
Distinguish different social
groups within the community
and look for separate solutions
for each group’s needs
Use different social media
channels to create closed
groups for: sharing info,
making polls, brainstorming,
giving visibility of the hidden
work, engaging, reporting
Transfer the ownership of
ideas, achievements and
activism to the active part of
the community. This also
include some responsibilities
Give perspective. Make people
understand that this process is
ongoing and is not limited only
to the deadlines of your
project.
Support with expertise. Where
internal community is not
enough, give your expertise or
find external one –technical,
administrative, creative …

7. Lead:
Experts:
Partners:
Funded by: This project has been funded with support from the European Commission. This publication
[communication] reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held
responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.”
“Funded by the Erasmus+ Programme of the European Union”