Will NPC villagers contribute to public works projects?

Isabelle hinted that villagers could donate to public works projects but that they probably won't succeed without my input.

So I assume I'm definitely going to have to chip some in for this stuff to happen, but when she says that does she mean other flesh and bone players can also donate, or will my NPC villagers also donate a few bells?

Other flesh and blood players can donate to public works projects, even people just visiting your town, not just other residents! Hope for rich friends!

Villagers do contribute towards public works projects, but the amount tends to be so negligible that you'll still end up paying for the majority of the project yourself. They do this automatically, and there's no dialogue option to engage or encourage them to do so.

In my town, the NPCs donate somewhere between 100 to 550 bells a day, but only after I've paid around 6000 bells to the project. Whether it works off a percentage of what you've paid, I'm not sure, but I think that's how it works.

NPC Villagers will donate to projects.

In my experience they may as well save their bells to randomly buy something off me because really, their help is nothing.

You will at most save 1,000 bells on a public works project due to villager aid. Do not expect this to happen because it very well may not.

Isabelle is most likely hinting towards the fact that NPC villagers can tell the mayor which public works project they want the player to have built.

Even with Isabelle announcing that NPC villagers love to have projects created faster- the game consists of Wi-Fi friends and the player donating and the NPC's hardly, if ever, give any to the projects.