{"id":10657,"date":"2026-06-01T18:15:13","date_gmt":"2026-06-01T10:15:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/icleiseas.org\/?p=10657"},"modified":"2026-06-01T18:15:13","modified_gmt":"2026-06-01T10:15:13","slug":"naga-city-youth-lead-the-charge-for-safer-more-inclusive-public-spaces","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/icleiseas.org\/index.php\/2026\/06\/01\/naga-city-youth-lead-the-charge-for-safer-more-inclusive-public-spaces\/","title":{"rendered":"Naga City youth lead the charge for safer, more inclusive public spaces"},"content":{"rendered":"
Teams of the youth-led projects \u201cTactical Urbanism for Safer Streets\u201d and \u201cS\u00e1rigan sa Kalye\u201d with Naga City Mayor Leni Robredo (frontmost, fifth from left), representatives of the Naga City Government, and the S\u00b2Cities local implementing partner WeSolve Foundation during the announcement of winning projects after the second Youth Innovation Fellowship Demo Day, last February 9, 2026. (Photo from the S\u00b2Cities Naga Facebook page<\/strong><\/span><\/a>).<\/span><\/i><\/h6>\n

The streets of Naga City, Philippines are slowly being transformed through youth-led innovations that aim to make the city a safer, more inclusive place for diverse communities.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Two projects received seed funding from the <\/span>Safe and Sound Cities (S\u00b2Cities) programme<\/strong><\/span><\/a> in February 2026 after they were chosen from nine projects developed by Naga City youth, who presented their projects in the second Youth Innovation Fellowship Demo Day last January 28-29, 2026 at the PAGCOR Multipurpose Evacuation Center, Naga City.<\/span><\/p>\n

Since then, the projects \u201cTactical Urbanism for Safer Streets\u201d and \u201cS\u00e1rigan sa Kalye\u201d have been gradually implemented in the city.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"

Members of the teams that developed \u201cTactical Urbanism for Safer Streets\u201d and \u201cS\u00e1rigan sa Kalye\u201d during the announcement of winning projects after the second Youth Innovation Fellowship Demo Day, last February 9, 2026. (Photo from the S\u00b2Cities Naga Facebook page<\/strong><\/span><\/a>).<\/p><\/div>\n

S\u00b2Cities is a global programme led by the Global Infrastructure Basel (GIB) Foundation, hosted by the Swiss Philanthropy Foundation, with the support of Fondation Botnar. It aims to improve young people\u2019s safety and well-being in urban environments. <\/span>Naga City is one of the eight programme cities<\/strong><\/span><\/a> of the S\u00b2Cities<\/strong><\/span>, and one of the two programme cities in the Philippines aside from Baguio City.<\/span><\/p>\n

The <\/span>Youth Innovation Fellowship<\/strong><\/span><\/a> is part of the programme\u2019s implementation in Naga City, which was first held during the programme\u2019s initial phase from 2023 to 2024.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cTactical Urbanism for Safer Streets\u201d is a project that employs tactical urbanism to redesign a critical school zone, transforming a vehicle-heavy road into a people- and pedestrian-centric street.<\/span><\/p>\n

As of May 2026, a pedestrian lane on Mt. Villanueva Ave. has been enhanced with a <\/span>community-created street mural<\/strong><\/span><\/a>\u2014one of the project\u2019s first street improvements.<\/span><\/p>\n

Meanwhile, <\/span>\u201cS\u00e1rigan sa Kalye\u201d<\/strong><\/span><\/a>\u2014which translates to \u201cTo lean on the streets\u201d in English\u2014is an initiative that aims to establish mobile and accessible safe spaces for the queer community through modular, collapsible booths that provide a variety of services on Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights (SRHR), ranging from health clinics to cultural exhibits.<\/span><\/p>\n

The S\u00b2Cities Youth Innovation Fellowship encourages local youth aged 14 to 30 years old to develop project ideas that aim to address the issues, concerns, and suggestions related to the safety and security of the youth in their city or community. Youth fellows will then undergo capacity building and mentorship to further develop their ideas through research and coordination with the local government.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201c[Through the help of S\u00b2Cities], we were able to have a conversation with the various sectors and the community, and identify [their] needs,\u201d said Samantha Fullante, City Youth Development Officer at the Naga City Youth Development Office<\/span><\/p>\n

ICLEI SEA supports the S\u00b2Cities\u2019 implementation in the Philippines by facilitating engagements with local governments.<\/span><\/p>\n

Currently, S\u00b2Cities is in its <\/span>second phase<\/strong><\/span><\/a> of implementation.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"

Youth fellows who presented their projects during the second Youth Innovation Fellowship Demo Day last January 28-29, 2026 at the PAGCOR Multipurpose Evacuation Center, Naga City. (Photo from the S\u00b2Cities Naga Facebook page<\/strong><\/span><\/a>).<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Teams of the youth-led projects \u201cTactical Urbanism for Safer Streets\u201d and \u201cS\u00e1rigan sa Kalye\u201d with Naga City Mayor Leni Robredo (frontmost, fifth from left), representatives of the Naga City Government, and the S\u00b2Cities local implementing partner WeSolve Foundation during the announcement of winning projects after the second Youth Innovation Fellowship Demo Day, last February 9, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":10658,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[52,51],"tags":[2932,2971,2229,1360,2148,776,953,2500,954,1288,961,2152,777,960,1880],"class_list":["post-10657","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured-news","category-news","tag-gedsi","tag-health","tag-innovation","tag-naga-city","tag-phase-2","tag-s2c-program","tag-s2cities","tag-s2cities-philippines","tag-safe-and-sound-cities","tag-safe-and-sound-cities-programme","tag-safety","tag-tactical-urbanism","tag-youth","tag-youth-safety","tag-youth-security"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/icleiseas.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10657","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/icleiseas.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/icleiseas.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/icleiseas.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/icleiseas.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10657"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/icleiseas.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10657\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10661,"href":"https:\/\/icleiseas.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10657\/revisions\/10661"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/icleiseas.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10658"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/icleiseas.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10657"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/icleiseas.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10657"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/icleiseas.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10657"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}