CURRENT DEMOCRACY COMMISSION GRANTS

Transparency International-Bulgaria (www.transparency-bg.org)
Monitoring Campaign Financing in Local Elections
Teaching NGOs to implement direct civil monitoring over campaign financing during the 2007 municipal elections in Bulgaria is the core of this project.   Through this project, Transparency International - Bulgaria has formed local coalitions of NGOs in six municipalities representing the six main administrative regions of the country. The monitoring and data-collection activities that the NGO collations are implementing will result in the creation of an Index for Transparency of Local Election Financing, which will be discussed at a national roundtable and disseminated through both print and electronic publications.

Center for Southeast European Studies (www.csees.net)
Young Leaders Promoting Bulgaria’s New Security Policy
The program is designed to increase young people’s awareness about important aspects of Bulgaria’s membership in NATO and the bilateral defense-cooperation agreement through which American servicemembers will train on Bulgarian military facilities. The program team is in the process of setting up and training a Young Leaders Team of 10 experts in security policy.  The team will then organize a series of public debates with university students and youth representatives of local NGOs in five university centers throughout Bulgaria (each followed by a press-conference).  The project will conclude with a final conference to bring together the young leaders with governmental officials and foreign diplomats.

The Association of Prosecutors in Bulgaria (www.apb.bg)
Investigating and Prosecuting Financial Crimes
Three two-day seminars to train 70 prosecutors in Sofia, Plovdiv, and Varna on how to better investigate and prosecute financial crimes are this project’s main program activities.  The project team is also working to produce a report of recommendations to the Supreme Prosecution Service and prepare a manual on financial-crimes investigations based on best practices discussed and developed at the training seminars.

Bulgarian School of Politics (www.schoolofpolitics.org)
Ukraine’s Road to the EU; Learning from Bulgaria
This bilateral project is being implemented to help Ukraine join the Euro-Atlantic club while building Bulgaria’s capacity to serve as a model for other Balkan and former Soviet states aspiring to NATO and/or EU membership. Bulgarian and Ukrainian experts, NGO activists, and younger politicians who influence their country gathered to share their experiences at an international workshop held in Velingrad in November 2007. They worked together to chart a Road Map to the EU for Ukraine based on Bulgaria’s achievements. A bilingual publication with the conference proceedings will be published and disseminated to selected national and international institutions.

Political Science Center (www.psc-bg.org)
Promoting Bulgaria’s Participation in NATO
The grantee is carrying on a PR campaign to promote Bulgaria’s NATO activities.  The main campaign events include a deliberative forum of 40 intellectuals from different spheres of public life and two public debates of civil-society representatives on the topic.  The project team is also organizing role-playing games in the format of parliamentary debates in six leading Bulgarian universities and 12 secondary schools throughout the country.  Four TV documentaries featuring the human face of participants in NATO’s international peacekeeping missions will show how such forces are vital in the efforts to resolve security problems in the modern world.

Friendship Foundation, Plovdiv (www.bg-bebe.com/index.php/freandship)
Helping Mothers Have a Choice on Whether to Breastfeed
Current and future parents who want to voice their breastfeeding preferences after the birth of their child are the target audience of this initiative.  Its major elements include installing information boards, showing promotional videos and educational films, and organizing photo exhibitions, open-house days, seminars, and training classes for hundred of parents in hospitals in Plovdiv, Stara Zagora, Burgas, and Sofia.  Reconnaissance visits at maternity wards will allow pregnant women to meet and speak with their doctors and communicate their concerns and breastfeeding preferences to hospital administrators. A concluding roundtable discussion will help promote the fact that new parents have the right to decide on important issues connected with their babies’ nutrition and healthcare.

Green Balkans NGO, Plovdiv (www.greenbalkans.org)
Building Public Support for Preserving Protected Natural Areas
A series of activities at the local and national level are envisaged to stimulate broad public interest in maintaining and enforcing the network of protected natural areas in Bulgaria.  The activities contemplated are varied.  They include planned and ad hoc eco-initiatives, capacity-building workshops for environmental journalists, meetings with public-opinion leaders, press-conferences highlighting specific cases of infringement upon valuable natural sites, direct mail campaigns mobilizing citizens and organizations, broadcasts of stirring video and radio clips disclosing violations upon nature, the dissemination of stickers and posters, and the launch of an interactive webpage.  A “flying group” of consultants (comprised of a lawyer, a PR specialist, and an expert on investigation practices) is already providing help to citizens and spontaneously established citizens’ unions and coalitions combating cases of infringements upon the country’s natural resources.

NATO Defense College Alumni Association (www.ndcaa-bg.org)
PR Campaign on U.S. Servicemember Training Activities on Bulgarian Bases  
American and Bulgarian high-ranking officers, members of the Bulgarian Parliament, military attachés, scientists, and diplomats are coming together to improve Bulgarians’ awareness of and support for Bulgaria’s activities in coalition forces abroad and the presence of U.S. service-members conducting training exercises in Bulgarian.  The campaign includes eight public events (seminars, conferences, meetings, movie presentations, and photo exhibitions) in seven towns and villages (Sliven, Yambol, Aitos, Bezmer, Nova Zagora, Mokren, Sungurlare) near to where U.S. troops will use Bulgarian military bases.

Free Youth Center, Vidin (www.fyc-vidin.org)
Promoting Roma Integration
The grantee will highlight the importance of ethnic tolerance and Roma integration in Bulgaria by drawing a parallel to the situation of African-Americans in the U.S. prior to the Supreme Court’s decision holding that segregation was unconstitutional.  The grantee will create a traveling exhibit about the history of America’s civil-rights movement (with a particular focus on the effect desegregation had on African-Americans’ education) designed to be visited by high-school students and citizens in four cities in Northwest Bulgaria. Ten volunteers—young people from both the Bulgarian and Roma ethnicities—are currently being taught to serve as guides to the exhibit. The project will also produce a pedagogical guide for teachers on how to teach tolerance and a website with the electronic version of the exhibition.

SOS – Families at Risk Foundation, Varna
Enforcing Laws Against Domestic Violence
A civil-court watch on domestic-violence cases in the municipalities of Varna, Provadiya and Devnya, coupled with family mediation services, will help local clients achieve quick, long-term solutions to their problems with little or no court interference. The program also will produce regular monitoring reports and a final report on the court watches, as well as organize a public forum in each of the three municipalities, followed by a final conference.

Forum Association
National TV Documentaries on America’s Use of Bulgarian Military Bases
To improve overall public awareness and increase people’s trust in BG-US defense cooperation, a film crew lead by top Bulgarian journalist Venelin Petkov is working on the production of a made-for-TV documentary about the joint military training exercises on Bulgarian bases.  bTV will broadcast the documentary during a regularly scheduled Sunday afternoon time slot.  The project plans to produce 1,000 DVD copies of the documentary and distribute them for free. The videos will be also uploaded for unlimited download on popular Internet portals.

Bulgarian Center for Development and Training (www.bcdt.bg)
Training Roma English Teachers in Underserved Communities
The program offers a 120-hour course for 20 Roma English teachers, selected on the basis of their availability to teach English to members of Roma communities, using Roma "practice students" for the 6 hours of practice teaching that are integral to the course.

Euro Atlantic Education Initiative Foundation
Promoting National Support for American Servicemembers’ Use of Bulgarian Military Bases
The project features a series of public information meetings in the cities of Burgas, Plovdiv, Ruse, Varna, and Veliko Turnovo to better inform the Bulgarian public on American servicemembers’ use of Bulgarian military bases, using representatives of the Ministry of Defense, the General Staff, and the U.S. Embassy.  The project will also produce and distribute brochures with answers to FAQs about the U.S.’s use of Bulgarian bases. 

Face to Face Foundation (www.facetoface.bg)
Advocacy Net: A Peer-to-Peer Initiative Combating Trafficking in Persons
Raising attention about the risks of human trafficking among local youths and teaching them on how to protect themselves are the main goals of this initiative, which is taking place in the towns Pravets, Botevgrad and Etropole. Sixty 16- to 17-year-old high-school students are taking part in a training program on how to distribute information, create effective messages, work with relevant authorities, and give presentations on TIP issues. These young, newly minted activists are organized in three teams of about 20 persons each, which work to increase local communities’ awareness of TIP issues via talks and discussions with their schoolmates, meetings with at-risk groups, such as children of single-parent households or orphans, and public events such as roundtable discussions and press conferences.

“Gemini” Bulgarian Gay Organization (www.bgogemini.org)
Combating Disability, Gender, Roma, and Sexual Orientation Discrimination
The project aims to build a positive identity for three marginalized groups (sexual and gender minorities, people with physical disabilities, and the Roma) in Bulgaria by educating different key groups (media, police, and the mainstream society) through targeted, accurate, and sensitive information to institutions.  The program will also monitor the implementation of the National Plan for Protection Against Discrimination and popularize activities and practices that promote tolerance. The key program activities include eight tolerance and inclusiveness-promotion campaigns in seven Bulgarian cities to increase minorities’ participation in public life and enhance their level of human-rights knowledge, as well as the society’s recognition of their rights.

European Information Center, Veliko Turnovo (www.europeinfocentre.bg)
“GLOW” Leadership Conference Series
The “Girls Leading Our World” (GLOW) leadership conference series features three training seminars followed by three regional conferences designed to increase the project-management skills and leadership potential of 15 to 18-year-old women, which will create a sustainable network among them at the local, regional, and national levels. The project will conclude with a national three-day conference providing a venue for further networking, training, and joint activities of the different regional groups from all over Bulgaria.

United Nations Association of Bulgaria (www.una-bg.org)
“Flying University” for Human Rights Training
The “Flying University” for human-rights training represents a series of two-day local seminars for teachers, organized by the coordinators of United Nations school clubs in 10 towns throughout Bulgaria.  The project will enable the trained teachers to put their newly acquired skills into practice and provide feedback that will be summarized and presented to the attention of Education Ministry experts.

Napredak Foundation, Pazarjik
Tutoring and Bulgarian Language Classes for the Roma Youth in Pazarjik
A total of sixty Roma students from the region are participating in an extracurricular educational program featuring after-school classes in mathematics, Bulgarian language, history, and literature taught by local Bulgarian teachers twice a week, three hours a day, during the school year.  An additional summer-school program will enable young Roma to study Bulgarian five times a week, two hours each day during the vacation period.  Parents of the participating students are eligible to join in the two programs and in the two team building excursions to help build up trust among participants and teachers.

Bulgarian Helsinki Committee (www.bghelsinki.org)
Addressing Gender Discrimination Through Awareness Raising and Legal Training
The program focuses on women who are victims or potential victims of gender-based discrimination (especially in the labor area).  The grantee is preparing a comprehensive analysis of existing national case law on gender-discrimination cases that, along with other materials, will be disseminated to employees, trade unions, and employers, to make them aware of the issue. The grantee is also implementing a media strategy encompassing the following: meetings with media representatives on the issue of gender discrimination, creating a network of journalists sensitive to the topic, and launching an online information center on the grantee’s website. A training seminar and a subsequent workshop for attorneys are scheduled to help them do their work in the field better, followed by a close-out event for judges on court decisions.