In early 2016, an extensive analysis was conducted to systematize the four projects. The fact that NA projects were a new addition to its DRR portfolio led USAID/OFDA/ LAC to undertake robust monitoring of their implementation. The standardized tools and systematization process represented an effort to maximize opportunities for learning both at the level of individual projects as well as across the urban DRR portfolio. This deep interest in understanding the strengths and weaknesses of the approach was also manifested in USAID/OFDA/LAC’s decision to support an implementer-driven postproject review (PPR) process of the status of community and institutional engagement one year after completion of the four “Urban DRR Projects: Neighborhood Approach,” awarded through the USAID Annual Program Statement (APS) in Guatemala, Haiti, and Peru in FY 2012. Financed through a sub-grant mechanism via Florida International University (FIU), NGO implementers—Catholic Relief Services (CRS), Project Concern International (PCI), Save the Children (SC), and World Concern Development Organization (WCDO)—were able to propose a methodology for returning to their project sites following completion of all activities to review the status of the works and/or processes undertaken by the projects.
These reviews, which took place 12 to 18 months following the end of the project implementation, were primarily aimed at determining the degree of success of the projects’ transition strategies. In other words, the review process offered the implementers the opportunity to assess whether their assumptions regarding the uptake of functions by neighborhood residents, local governments, and/or other actors had been correct. The PPRs, then, represent the final step of the systematization process.