Discussion of a possible administrative-territorial reform (ATR) in Ukraine after the 2004 presidential elections acquired new meaning and momentum in the state. This area of activity of the executive branch was designated by the President of Ukraine as a priority, as evidenced by the introduction of the position of vice prime minister for administrative reform in the Cabinet structure and the appointment of Roman Bezsmertnyi to this position.
Bringing the state's administrative and social services closer to the population and transferring executive functions to the executive committees of territorial community councils is defined as the main goal of the proposed reform. The project also envisages that bodies such as district state administrations will be eliminated entirely, while regional administrations will have a rather limited set of powers, which will effectively boil down to monitoring compliance with legislation in the respective territory. Territorial communities will receive the maximum benefit from the reform. They will gain the opportunity to fill their own budgets by expanding the local tax base (such as administering the land tax).
Recently, the population has been receiving a lot of diverse, and sometimes contradictory, information regarding the mechanisms, principles and main provisions of the ATR. Sometimes it seems that politicians are trying to draw ordinary citizens into discussing this topic, which is quite complex even for experts. Experts of our Center believe that there is no need to draw the population into such a discussion, since changes to the administrative-territorial system of the state will be introduced by parliament, and not through a referendum, whatever individual politicians might want. The principles and mechanisms of implementing administrative-territorial reform should be discussed by professional experts, deputies of all levels, and politicians, although even among them it is not easy to find agreement. Ordinary citizens should know what they will get as a result and what the possible risks of the reform are.
The main risk of implementing the reform is sabotage by local officials of the executive branch, who will significantly lose powers and, in many cases, jobs. The approach of parliamentary elections and possible speculation by politicians on this topic during the election campaign also does not add chances for this reform to pass through parliament. Overall, experts of our center fully agree with the structure proposed by Mr. Bezsmertnyi: "territorial community – district – region." We also consider it a positive point that at this stage no fundamental change in the boundaries of administrative-territorial entities (oblasts and districts) is planned, while large cities are granted the status of separate city-regions.
Sharp discussions in the political environment are also ongoing regarding the timing of introducing changes to the administrative-territorial system. The relevant minister believes that this should be done as soon as possible; most experts agree that such a large-scale process should take place gradually. We adhere to the opinion that the law on changing the administrative-territorial system should be adopted after expert discussion at the end of 2005, and enter into force after the local and parliamentary elections of 2006, approximately in the middle of next year. This period will be the most suitable for large-scale transformations in the regions and at the same time will encourage many local politicians toward a more active and open civic stance and closer cooperation with ordinary citizens during the election period.
As a conclusion, it can be predicted that the ATR will not cause particular upheavals in our region, since the administrative-territorial structure of the oblast generally corresponds to the vision proposed by Roman Bezsmertnyi, although we do not rule out the possibility of consolidating local territorial communities of the oblast to achieve the common interests of their residents.