The VIII European Congress of Local Governments entitled "New Solidarity for a New Era" was held in Mikolajki on March 6-7, 2023, with the participation of the Director of the Association of Municipalities of the Republic of Poland Euroregion Baltic, Mr. Marcin Żuchowski. This is an event attended by more than 2,000 guests from Central and Eastern European countries. During the two days, 120 events were held, including program blocks, reports, panels, workshops, lectures, presentations and a gala ceremony with the presentation of awards.

Congress, is an international platform for the exchange of ideas and a meeting place for local government leaders, regional elites with representatives of state administration, NGOs and business.

The event is organized by the Foundation Institute for Eastern Studies and this year's main partner was the local government of the Warmian-Masurian Voivodeship.

During the Congress, a panel entitled "The Baltic Sea and European port cities - economics, ecology and geopolitics" was held, to which the Director of the Association, Mr. Marcin Żuchowski, was invited. He spoke, among other things, about the WaterMan project, its assumptions, pilot activities involving small infrastructure in each partner country. He also spoke about building the common good on the basis of broad international partnerships and encouraged participants to undertake similar project initiatives in the field of ecology and water economics.

The topic of current opportunities and problems of cross-border cooperation from the perspective of different regions, from the European Union area and partner countries such as Ukraine and the Western Balkans, was also discussed. He called the common theme of this cooperation the creation of partnerships for peace-building, which is particularly timely in the context of today's international situation.

During the Gala, a representative of our member municipality, Mr. Rober Waraksa - mayor of Olsztynek, became the Laureate of the "Local Government Friendly to Youth" Award. Our sincere congratulations!

We would like to remind you that the WaterMan project started in January 2023 and its official opening will take place during the meeting of all partners in Kalmar on March 14-16, 2023.

The two-day conference marked the beginning of the NURSECOAST II project, whose activities involve extensive international partnerships. The leader of the project is the Institute of Fluid Flow Machinery of the Polish Academy of Sciences in Gdansk, which is the main originator of the entire project.

The project partners:

- Robert Szewalski Institute of Fluid-Flow Machinery of the Polish Academy of Sciences (IMP PAN) (Leader, Poland)
- Kaunas University of Technology (Lithuania)
- Natural Resources Institute Finland (Finland)
- SYKLI Environmental School of Finland (Finland)
- Keep the Archipelago Tidy Association (Finland)
- Aalborg Univesity (Denmark)
- Fundacja Wspólnoty Burego Misia im. Bogdana Jańskiego (Poland)
- Stockholm Environment Institute Tallinn Centre (Estonia)
- Jurmala Udens Water Utility (Latvia)
- Municipality of Söderhamn (Sweden)
- Municipality of Ingå (Finland)
- Urząd Gminy Smołdzino (Poland)
- JSC Neringa water (Lithuania)
- Ecovillage Egeskoven (Denmark)
- NK forsyning A/S (Denmark)
- Stowarzyszenie Gmin RP Euroregion Bałtyk (Poland)
- EUCC - The Coastal Union Germany (Germany)

The meeting was divided into 2 days, during which the various components of the project, its scope of substantive activities and planned pilots were discussed. Based on the jointly developed methodological framework, each model region will develop a local strategy for pilot investments. Along with these strategies, exemplary and complementary pilot wastewater treatment activities will be carried out.

Participating municipalities and water companies from other countries, as well as expert experts from inside and outside the partnership, will bring their experiences to the development of each model strategy and pilot action. In this way, they will be enriched by available experiences from inside and outside the BSR, and will be based on the international state of knowledge.
A mutual learning arena will be established to enable transnational co-creation of solutions to accompany local work processes.

The project will last 36 months, its activities will take place in Poland, Lithuania, Latvia and almost all of Scandinavia (Estonia, Finland, Sweden, Denmark) and Germany.

The leader outlined the key work plan and tasks that need to be completed, including pilot activities - pilot preparatory work, documents, permits.

All partners were asked and presented their activities, how they will be carried out, what methodology along with the expected results and benefits.

We look forward to the development of this very interesting venture, which we will keep you informed about.

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Since the launch of the WaterMan project, which took place in early January 2023, several online meetings have already taken place, with all partners from 6 countries participating. However, the first live meeting of Polish partners took place last Thursday in Braniewo and it was hosted by the City Hall with the Mayor, Mr. Tomaszek Sielicki.

The meeting was attended by representatives of all entities that are Polish partners in the project:

Braniewo City Hall, Municipal Waterworks Ltd., Gdansk University of Technology, Association of Polish Municipalities Euroregion Baltic. A total of 18 people took part in the meeting. Each of the partners presented the members of their teams with information on their responsibilities.

During the meeting, important issues for the partners were addressed. Due to the fact that several new people have joined the task stage, the basic information about the project, timeframe, overview of the scope of tasks and also the project consortium - who is responsible for what, further networking activities in terms of support with external experts, online pre-conference were discussed at the beginning. The main inaugural conference in Kalmar was also the subject of the meeting in Braniewo.

The essence of this meeting was also to prepare for the implementation of the pilots that will be carried out by the team of the Gdansk University of Technology in the City of Braniewo. Under this item, the scope of preparation for the pilot was discussed, the roles of the various partners for this task and the division of responsibilities, as well as the budget necessary for the implementation of the task. Also discussed were the responsibilities of all parties regarding communication and outreach activities, conducting the necessary promotion on websites and social media profiles, and other permitted forms of popularizing the works and their effects to a wide audience.

The talks also covered reporting in BAMOS+, the general rules to be followed, and payments and their forms.

The partners also exchanged contacts and after a few hours a working meeting was concluded.