Thursday (02/07/2019), the participatory monitoring and evaluation (M&E) team from four villages in Surakarta city, namely Setabelan, Semanggi, Sangkrah, and Kadipiro, in cooperation with the Bappeda (Regional Development Planning Agency) and USAID IUWASH PLUS held a stakeholder meeting on sanitation and water supply in Pendopo Seto Manggolo, Setabelan village in Surakarta city.
The meeting, which is locally named as Tembang Sinom (Temu Rembug Warga Babagan Sanitasi dan Air Minum/Community Meeting for Sanitation and Water Supply) and was held for the first time in Surakarta city, was attended by the Vice Mayor of Surakarta city, village heads of USAID IUWASH PLUS supported areas, heads of Banjarsari and Pasar Kliwon sub-districts, a regional parliament member, local government staff, KOTAKU, AKANSI, private sectors, and journalists.
During this meeting, the participatory M&E team presented the monitoring and evaluation results that the team had carried out. The results show improvements on water and sanitation access as well as in community’s hygiene practices.
In addition, the participatory M&E team also presented the recommendations and proposed programs to improve WASH access in Surakarta city, which included the need to build more IPAL Komunal and increase access to PDAM services.
Responding to the community’s recommendations, KOTAKU plans to support the construction of an IPAL Komunal to serve 60 house connections in Sangkrah village this year. In addition, Disperum KPP (the Office of Housing, Settlements, and Land) of Surakarta city is planning to carry out a Master Meter program to serve 52 houses in Setabelan village this year
The Vice Mayor of Surakarta city, Achmad Purnomo, appreciated the Tembang Sinom as a forum to discuss the water and sanitation issues at community level and identify alternatives to prevent the problems to come in the future.
“I truly support this activity to be held regularly. Yet, it should be followed with the implementation by community members,” said Achmad Purnomo.
In the future, Tembang Sinom is planned to be held every six months.
Tembang Sinom was also complemented with an exhibition so that the participants could discuss and learn more about WASH activities at the community level, including learning a model of toilet with septic tank.
Stakeholder meeting is the last part of the participatory M&E cycle. The cycle includes training for the community participatory M&E team, household monitoring, evaluation on community action plan, data analysis, community meeting, and completed with the stakeholder meeting. This cycle will conducted every six months by the participatory M&E team.
As the last step of participatory M&E cycle, the stakeholder meeting preparation starts with a pre-event coaching process from USAID IUWASH PLUS team to the community team and followed by a rehearsal for the meeting.
Following Surakarta city, Barru district and Medan city will also hold a stakeholder meeting respectively on the third week of February 2019.
