Civic Dollars - creating healthier citizens and happier communities

Civic Dollars is a social currency platform developed to encourage active health and community engagement by incentivising greater use of parks and open spaces while also allowing our users to help their communities get access to skills, expertise and advice they could never access before.

Stephen McPeake - CEO and Founder of Civic Dollars

We will be solving the health issues that have been accelerated by Covid restrictions mainly obesity, type 2 diabetes and heart disease being caused by sedentary lifestyles. In the UK alone, research has shown that an extra 3 million people have become inactive since lockdown restrictions were introduced, putting pressure on a health service that was already stretched and an issue that was already costing the UK government £27 billion per year in direct and indirect costs. 

Although this was an issue before the pandemic, the lockdown restrictions have expedited health problems due to sedentary lifestyles. Worldwide, around 1 in 3 women and 1 in 4 men do not do enough physical activity to stay healthy. This statistic will get worse over the next five years as we deal with the fallout of the pandemic and recurring lockdowns

Citizens across the globe will need a universal nudge to get them more active, something that will incentivise them to visit, parks, open spaces and get outdoors in a safe and responsible way. 

The Civic Dollars platform primarily serves the citizen and the communities as a way to encourage physical activity and civic pride. It will give them the nudge to visit parks more often, and even if they go there and sit on a park bench to enjoy the fresh air, it has resulted in incidental activity as they have walked to that bench. We intend to reduce the health inequality which is particularly bad in areas of deprivation, by not only reward those who are already active but to provide inactive people with the necessary nudge to be more active.

The community groups benefit as we use them as the catalyst to get their members active, and then to donate some of their Civic Dollars back to the group so they can access rewards that they could never afford or get access to before. We work closely with the community groups to identify their needs and requirements so that the rewards are enticing enough for them to continue supporting the platform and keep their members using the platform.

As our platform is a "Tech for Good" solution, almost all outcomes will be for the Public good including:

1. Improving citizen health by incentivising park usage and getting access to healthy rewards that will improve their lifestyle.

2. Community Groups & Charities will benefit by getting corporate skills and expertise they could never afford or access before

3. Businesses will get access to a portal that will give them a social impact dashboard showing the rewards that they have supplied to users and community groups & charities. this will also display the amount of hours of park activity that happened due to the user donations

4. Councils and citizens will benefit from cleaner and more liveable cities as the reported issues from the Civic Dollars app like anti social behaviour and litter will be dealt with in a more efficient manner.

Our solution will have a tangible impact on all sections of society, particularly on physical health and improved communities.

Even though the Civic Dollars platform was conceived before the Covid-19 pandemic to tackle the issue of sedentary lifestyles, we were fortunate to be developing the platform during the initial stages of lockdown and had the ability to pivot our focus to a solution that would help post-pandemic. We realised that the health crisis was going to get worse during the restrictive period and something will be needed after lockdown to entice people back out to get physically active again.

We have the process in place so that users can earn the Civic Dollars by spending time in a "earn zone" and they can get access to health rewards or they can donate them to charities/ community groups. The groups benefit from rewards from local businesses and the businesses get to issue their Civic Dollars to staff for volunteering in community groups.

The big winner will be the community groups as our research has shown that groups were badly affected by the pandemic, especially from a fundraising perspective and need a solution like Civic Dollars to get them back on track.

We have the opportunity with Civic Dollars to have a global impact on health and wellbeing and our ambition is that it will be used as a multi faceted nudge solution by all cities and regions to help them deal with the after effects of the Covid-19 pandemic.

We think the solution will cross over to the other key areas including Circular economy and mobility and sustainability as the civic dollars that get earned within the zones can be traded with the street market vendors for discounts / rewards or for a public transport/ public bike voucher that will promote multi modal transport.

We want to help cities and municipalities localise their UN Sustainable Development Goal targets. We are specifically focused on 3. Good Health and Wellbeing and 11. Sustainable Cities and communities as these goals directly align with our company values and fit perfectly with our human centric solution and ongoing development roadmap.
We aim for our platform to be the solution of choice for cities and regions that want to make an impact on sustainability, active transport, and health of their citizens.

We will consistently monitor and evaluate the impact our solution is having on society using a number of measurable metrics including park usage, transaction data and social impact.

The number of zone visits and Daily active users will be an important metric so that we know users are still using the platform and the rewards are doing their job of attracting users to download, register and initiate a session in the zones. 

An example from our pilot was that in one week using one park as a test we had 181 downloads, 83 registered users and 631 minutes of activity recorded.

Success will also be measured on how many Civic Dollars are donated to community groups on a weekly basis. It is this transactional value that will be an indication of our success. 

One of the main barriers we are currently experiencing is that city councils have very tight budgets and we have to convince them that our solution will provide a Return of Investment as well as the Social Return of Investment that will have the necessary impact on public health.

This issue will only get worse over the next three years as budgets will get even more tight especially with all the aid  and support that has been given out by all governments across the globe.

Another barrier is to make sure people trust the platform and don't see it as a data gather tool (especially after the backlash received by the UK government over Track and Trace app).

Businesses will be more cautious about supporting charities and community groups as their purse strings are tightened as well. As we are asking them for rewards that are based on time and expertise of their staff rather than cash, we hope that it will be more appealing to them.

Belfast City Council

Leeds City Council

Dublin City Council

Queens University Belfast

When I first read about the Trinity challenge I felt the solution we have developed would be an ideal fit to the ethos and mission of the challenge as we want to improve the resilience of health and economic systems, and address the disproportionate impacts of outbreaks and pandemics, particularly on vulnerable groups and areas of deprivation

The Trinity Challenge will help us overcome the barriers by providing funds and access to expertise that can help us prove the Return of investment to the city, council,  health bodies and government officials. Not only economically but socially as well.

I would like to partner with any organisation that would like to offer rewards to users or groups to support their Corporate Social Responsibility.

I would be particularly interested in partnering with insurance companies that could offer discounts of their premiums in lieu of Civic Dollars.