As revealed by the Special Euro-barometer “Europeans’ attitudes towards security” of December 2017, security and in particular terrorism are at the top of Europeans’ concerns, with a significant fall in the proportion of respondents thinking that the EU is a secure place to live in.
How can cities and local police forces better protect their vulnerable public spaces and citizens? PACTESUR aims to build the capacities of cities and local actors in the field of the security of public spaces vulnerable to terrorist threats and other threats. Through a bottom-up approach, PACTESUR gathers local decision makers, security forces, urban security experts, urban planners, IT developers, trainers, front-line practitioners, designers and other professionals in order to shape new European local policies to secure public spaces against terrorist attacks.
Activities
PACTESUR will draw conclusions from lessons learnt and create training materials for security forces, information tools for citizens and guidelines for local authorities to build up knowledge on how to design better policies to secure public spaces.
Several activities are planned within the project:
- reflection on standards, legal frameworks and local governance for the elaboration of common standard guidelines, response protocols and soft laws;
- development of specialised training programmes for local security operators;
- awareness-raising of citizens and politicians on their role on prevention and as security actors;
- identification of the most adapted local investments for securing open and touristic public spaces by sharing field experience;
- setting up local pilot sites equipped to prevent and promptly react to terrorist threats while preserving the urban environment.
The role of Efus
The European Forum for Urban security will:
- lead a working group of 11 cities, European capitals and others that have specific issues and knowledge regarding the protection of urban public spaces.
The 10 cities are: Athens, Edimburgh, Essen, Gdańsk, Leeds, Lisboa, London, Madrid, Munich, Riga, Xàbia.
- lead the associate expert committee of 15 experts who take part in all the major project activities including the European Security Weeks, field visits in the pilot cities, and the working groups.
- lead the working groups on European standards and transnational cooperation set up with the partners from the 10 associated cities and the expert advisory committee.
- organise 3 local governance workshops in each of the 3 partner cities with the participation of local civil society
Consortium
- City of Nice (FR) – project leader
- City of Liege (BE)
- City of Turin (IT)
- European Forum for Urban Security (FR)
- Associazione Nazionale Comuni Italiani – Piemonte (IT)
Duration
January 2019 – December 2021
Financing
PACTESUR is 90% funded by the DG HOME’s (European Commission) 
Internal Security Fund – Police programme.
Contact
- Martí Navarro Regàs, Programme Manager: navarroregas@efus.eu
- Tatiana Morales, Programme Manager: morales@efus.eu
