Anyone can submit ideas for Tallinn's participatory budget.

After the ideas are collected, an expert committee formed by the Tallinn City Government will evaluate their feasibility and compliance with the established requirements. The chosen ideas will go to a referendum, where the ideas that receive the most votes will be implemented in 2023.

The city of Tallinn organizes the whole process: it informs the public about the initiation of a participatory budget, it collects, evaluates and introduces ideas to the public, and it organizes the implementation of selected ideas. The city also decides on the rules: the size of the participatory budget, how many and what types of ideas can be submitted for funding, how compliance with the rules is assessed, etc. The city's task is also to keep an eye on how the process is going: to analyze whether it fulfills its goals, whether the information reaches the residents, whether the desired number of people participate in the process, etc.

The task of the expert committee is to assess the feasibility of the ideas. The feasibility of ideas is analyzed from a temporal, financial, technical and legal point of view, and their compliance with the basic requirements is assessed.

The committee also has the right to integrate and supplement similar ideas in the course of analysis and evaluation. In addition, the committee has the right to exclude from public vote ideas that are not feasible during the participatory budget project. You can find more detailed criteria in the Tallinn City Council regulation “Procedures for processing Tallinn's participatory budget”.

Independent experts of different fields who are able to appropriately assess the cost and time requirements of the ideas as well as the technical, public area planning and legal aspects of submitted ideas make up the committee.

The members of the committee include: the Urban Environment and Public Works Department, the Sports and Youth Department, the Transportation Department, the Urban Planning Department, the Financial Service, representatives of district governments and external experts in the field (urban planners, landscape architects, entrepreneurs, etc.).

The ideas implemented by the city of Tallinn will be determined by a referendum in which all citizens at least 14 years whose place of residence, according to the population register is Tallinn, can participate. Each participant can vote for up to two ideas of their choice in the district where they live.
For example: a citizen whose registration is in the Kristiine district cannot vote for ideas presented for the Pirita, Nõmme or other districts.  

The vote is aimed primarily towards registered residents, as they contribute their tax revenue to the city's budget, from which a participatory budget also comes from.

In order to ensure the legitimacy of a participatory budget and create added value for as many people as possible, a minimum number of voters has been established for each district: Kristiine, Nõmme and Pirita – 500 people; Haabersti, Mustamäe, Kesklinn and Põhja-Tallinn – 1000 people; Lasnamäe – 1500 people.

For example, if a citizen submits an idea for implementation in the Nõmme district, then the precondition for the success of the project is that at least 500 people have voted for participatory budget projects in Nõmme. It is therefore in the interest of all those who come up with ideas to introduce and disseminate a participatory budget as a holistic project for the community. The total number of voters in the district is taken into account, not the number of votes for a single idea. The latter decides which idea wins the vote and is implemented when the minimum voter quota in the district is met. If the minimum voter quota is not met in some districts, then the participatory budget team reserves the right to change the deadline for the referendum.

If the idea does not fully fit in with the terms of a participatory budget, let us know about your proposal anyway. For example, if the idea is feasible practically immediately or does not require large budgetary resources, often the ideas presented are later implemented outside participatory budget or included in the city's development plan. If needed, you can also contact us for further information via the contact information mentioned here.