"Welcome" or "No Entry for Outsiders"?
It is worth noting that there have never been problems with informing the city community about the convening of city council sessions in Lutsk. As soon as the city mayor issued an order convening a session, it was immediately posted on the official website of the city council and also distributed among local media. The session convened at the end of January was no exception. Accordingly, both journalists and active citizens clearly knew the date and time of the session, as well as the main issues submitted for consideration by the deputies.
There were also never problems with media access to the hall where council sessions were held. Electronic, print, and online media could freely send their journalists to cover the work of the session. True, the premises where the deputies meet is quite small, so there are not many places in it. Therefore, the city council of the VI convocation introduced an accreditation procedure for journalists in its Rules of Procedure, although the practice of already-held sessions showed that non-accredited media representatives could also freely attend the session. Accreditation was introduced only to cooperate more closely with the media and in particular to give them the opportunity to obtain session materials. The good tradition of cooperation with the local private TV channel "Avers", which provides free live broadcasting of city council sessions, also continued with the new council.
There were also no problems with ordinary city residents attending the plenary sessions of the council, since the council's Rules of Procedure directly provide for such a possibility. True, on January 26 itself there was a small incident when council security did not want to let into the premises where the session was to be held a large number of citizens who were protesting against the allocation of land next to their houses for new construction. The security motivated its actions by the fact that all the people would not fit in the hall where there is little space. True, later the conflict was resolved and people were allowed into the building.
The transport issue was not resolved, they did not get to the land issues
44 deputies (out of 50) and the city mayor took part in the 5th session of the city council. 155 issues were included in the session agenda, which had been previously considered in the council's commissions. Conventionally, all of them could be divided into three groups: economic, organizational, and land. Among the financial issues, the most important were: on amendments to the city budget for 2011, on the introduction of a tourist tax, on the establishment of a fee for certain types of entrepreneurial activity.
Among the economic issues, very lively discussions revolved around the issue of the financial and economic state of the Lutsk Electric Transport Enterprise (LPE), which is in a difficult situation. There are two reasons for this state: the state's debts to the city for transporting privileged categories of passengers and the inability to fulfill obligations to the "Bohdan" Corporation for buses previously taken on lease. After hearing the information from the enterprise's director, the deputies began a discussion about ways to save the communal enterprise. In particular, it was proposed to split this enterprise into two separate units (trolleybus and bus) and give the bus routes to interested investors. However, there were also opinions that LPE could be brought out of the crisis thanks to more effective management and repayment of all debts by the state. For a more detailed study of this issue, the deputies created a temporary control commission.
The deputies also spent a very long time considering the issue of creating a temporary control commission to study problematic issues of financing preschool educational institutions and the program for financing cultural, artistic, and cultural studies events in the city. Due to lengthy discussions that took place between the deputies, most of the agenda items were not considered that day, so a recess was announced until the next day.
Instead, on January 27, 2011, the deputies worked more productively. Thus, the deputies adopted a number of Programs, in particular: support for small entrepreneurship in the city for 2011-2012, organization of rescue of people on the city's water bodies in the summer period of 2011, development of the city's road economy for 2010-2014, and improvement of Lutsk for 2011-2012. Since at the previous regular session the deputies approved a new structure of the executive bodies of the city council, at this session they approved new Regulations on the departments and divisions of the city council. A number of amendments to the council's Rules of Procedure were also introduced.
However, even on the second day of the council session, the deputies did not consider all the issues. Therefore, a decision was again made to announce a recess in the work of the session, which will continue its work next week. The deputies still had more than 80 land issues left to consider.
Divide and rule
It should be noted that the 5th session of the city council confirmed some assumptions about the existence of several lines of confrontation among the deputy corps. Thus, during the two days of the session, the city mayor and the deputies could not positively resolve the issue of electing two more persons to the composition of the council's Executive Committee. Although the candidates for these places had long been agreed upon between the city mayor and the factions that proposed their fellow party members, in particular the "Batkivshchyna" All-Ukrainian Association and the "For Ukraine!" party. At first, the city mayor "backed out" of the agreements, submitted 3 candidates for two vacant seats on the Executive Committee, and proposed to determine the members of the Executive Committee by means of a rating vote. Most deputies objected to such a method of voting, appealing to the "mayor" that it was he who should choose two candidates and put them to a vote. As a result, the city mayor withdrew the issue from consideration. On the next day of the session, the city mayor submitted to the council's consideration the candidacy of only a representative of the "Batkivshchyna" All-Ukrainian Association, but then the deputies from this party themselves, of whom there were two times fewer than the faction numbers, proposed to withdraw the issue of supplementing the Executive Committee from consideration. Instead, the proposal to include a representative of the "For Ukraine!" party in the Executive Committee was not voiced at all. Therefore, the issue of electing members of the Executive Committee is predictably going to be one of the conflictual ones at the next sessions, since each of the mentioned factions and the "mayor" want benefits primarily for themselves.
Among other lines of conflict: blocking of the active activity of deputy A. Kozyura from Our Ukraine by the "Batkivshchyna" All-Ukrainian Association faction (refusal to include him in control commissions, non-support of the deputy's initiatives); the attempt by deputy S. Hryhorenko, elected on the list of the "Batkivshchyna" All-Ukrainian Association, to build his own public line of behavior different from the party line (putting forward proposals that contradict the faction's proposals); attempts by the "Batkivshchyna" All-Ukrainian Association faction to pressure smaller factions (introducing amendments to the Rules of Procedure developed specifically by the deputies of their faction).
Currently, there is no clearly formed majority in the Lutsk City Council. There are situational alliances of different factions for specific issues. In addition, there are already conflicts within individual factions, which gives the city mayor the opportunity to individually negotiate with deputies about supporting specifically his decisions.
For reference: Monitoring of the work of the Lutsk City Council and the city mayor is carried out within the framework of the OPORA Civic Network project on public democratic monitoring of newly elected local self-government bodies in 15 communities of the country.
Mykhailo Shelep, regional representative of the OPORA Civic Network in the Volyn region mike.shelep@gmail.com, 067-4165086