The meeting of the Board of the Association of Ukrainian Cities has taken place in the Kiev city administration. On behalf of Mayor Vadym Boichenko, Mariupol was represented by the secretary of the city council Stepan Makhsma.
The participants considered the Association’s proposals regarding amendments to the Constitution of Ukraine regarding the territorial organization of power and local self-government.
The concept developed by AUC proposes to introduce a two-level local government: the primary level is the municipality and the secondary level is the region. As the chairman of AUC, Mayor of Kyiv Vitaliy Klytschko, noted that it is necessary to preserve the model of a strong mayor at the municipality level,. ‘Residents of each municipality must elect their deputies to the regional council, and municipal councils can recall them. Despite the fact that the most important decisions of the regional council require consultation with the municipal councils. And the decision of the regional councils is proposed to be implemented by their executive bodies,’ he stressed.
Among the main changes, as Stepan Makhsma noted, the Board of the Association of Ukrainian Cities recommends the adoption of a draft law, which will improve the financial capabilities of local budgets. ‘We have been moving towards this for a long time and today in the draft law we are talking about the fact that the basic subsidy must be allocated to the budgets of communities in 100% instead of 80%, as it is now. These are new opportunities for local communities,’ Mahsma emphasized.
He also noted that at the meeting it was decided to recommend: that in 2020 local budgets continue to receive revenues from excise taxes on fuel and tobacco, as well as from shared participation of developers. Among the good news: there will be an increase in the educational subvention, health care costs, as well as a subvention for improving the social protection of secondary educators.
A separate topic was the Strategy of the Association of Ukrainian Cities on ensuring equal rights and opportunities for women and men for 2020-2022 and the Action Plan for the implementation of the Strategy for 2020.
A number of issues related to working moments: the plan of the Board and the Executive Directorate of ACU for 2020, the admission of new members to the Association, etc.
Stepan Makhsma said that 44 new members entered the Association of Ukrainian Cities. Therefore, now the ACU has 872 members, including 484 united territorial communities.
