Out of the 17 winning projects chosen for the Public Service Innovation Fund this year, 6 belong to local authorities.
The purpose of the Innovation Fund is to turn innovative ideas from across public service organisations into reality
This year 17 projects were chosen from 83 submissions and will be awarded a total of €725,000. There were three different categories - digital transformation, citizen support innovation, and green and sustainable initiatives.
The winning local authority projects included:
Digital transformation
Cork City Council aims to create the first Irish local government Information Sharing Analysis Centre (ISAC) to counter cyber threats and allow two-way sharing of information between the private and public sectors.
Citizen support innovation
Leitrim County Council will use Geographic Information System (GIS) technology based on ArcGIS (a location-based analytics tool) to develop a new way of communicating key emergency and non-emergency information to the widest community possible.
Dublin City Council will establish 'BETAhood' an online platform that will enable local neighbourhoods to request and trial ‘tactical urbanism’ solutions in their area and community. This urban environment project will focus on the rapid deployment of innovative improvements to local neighbourhoods and communities in Dublin.
Green and sustainable initiatives
Waterford City and County Council will deploy sensors to bottle banks across pilot sites to manage the capacity and send alerts to bin companies when full.
Donegal County Council will use a specially prepared compost to tackle the challenges posed by Japanese knotweed infestations.
Louth County Council intends to use AI solutions to improve intelligent identification of road defects and provide valuable information on other road assets including traffic signs and road markings.
You can find out more about the winning projects here.