Partnership between public and private sectors for the Management of Urban Parks in the city of São Paulo (SP, Brazil)

Abstract

Among the environmental problems caused by human activities is the reduction of green spaces, indicating that the greater the urbanization, the greater the reduction in these spaces. The city of São Paulo reached its goal of reaching the number of 100 municipal parks by the year of 2012. The management and maintenance of these spaces has become a challenge for the public administration, and the solution is focused on a partnership between the public and private sectors. The perception of specialists on the role of the Public Private Partnership (PPP) for the management of Urban Parks was analyzed. Data collection was through structured interviews using the Snowball Method. The interviews were recorded, transcribed and analyzed using the ATLAS TI Software. Content analysis consisted of a pre-analysis of the experts' speeches, and in a second moment the excerpts of the speeches were categorized. In the experts' perceptions, the benefits of PPPs are related to an improvement in the quality of services provided and a reduction in public costs, since the risks will be shared. PPPs have benefits for the management of parks in São Paulo in the common concession model, being an important instrument for cities to improve their environmental infrastructure. It is concluded that the partnership with the private sector improves the quality of services provided in urban park areas, as the government does not have resources to do so. Moreover, the main challenge is the dialogue between the government and society, involving the management council of the parks involved.