Senkevych explains why liquidation of rayon administrations is postponed «after the war»

Mayor of Mykolaiv Oleksandr Senkevych wants to have a new structure of the city hall by autumn, photo by NikVesti

The mayor of Mykolaiv, Oleksandr Senkevych, has said that he has no plans to reorganise the city's district administrations, as he announced earlier when he presented the structure of executive bodies developed on the basis of Ernst & Young recommendations a few months ago.

During the presentation of the draft decision on the reorganisation of the structure of executive bodies of the Mykolaiv City Council on 7 August, it turned out that four district administrations of the city will remain budget managers and retain some of their powers, reports «NikVesti».

Earlier, we analysed the proposed draft decision, which envisages the liquidation of two departments: the anti-corruption department, which is to be merged with the executive committee, and the energy department, which is to be merged with the Capital Construction Department (CCD), and the creation of three new units: Internal Audit Service, Inspectorate for Amenities and Procurement Department, as well as massive renaming: for example, Housing and Utilities - «Municipal Economy», Department of Economics - «Strategic Development and Investments», Human Resources Department - «Personnel Department». In general, the number of spending units is planned to be reduced from 21 to 15, although earlier there was talk of reducing them to 9.

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During the discussion of the draft decision, Olena Kiselyova, MP from «European Solidarity», drew attention to the fact that in the proposed document, district administrations remain independent structural units and will not cease to be spending units. It was assumed that they would no longer be engaged in street cleaning, private sector repairs or landfill elimination. These functions were to be transferred to the level of departments.

See also: District administrations in Mykolaiv: Why are they needed, and how do the heads work?

Then the heads of administrations reacted openly: Oleksandr Bereza and Hanna Remennikova expressed their concerns. Both are members of the city council from the pro-mayor faction «Proposal» and at the same time head the city's Central and Ingul districts.

- I remember that during the previous discussions and comments it was announced that administrations were to be reorganised, but now I see that they remain in the status of executive bodies, with the status of a legal entity, and, most importantly, they remain in the status of budgetary manager. Why did the concept change? As I remember, if we take the comments and audit reports as a basis, there was a more radical concept of change. Maybe something happened that we should know?" asked MP Olena Kiselyova.

The draft updated structure of the executive bodies of Mykolaiv City Council, which was presented to the deputies on 7 August, screenshot of NikVesti online broadcast of the city council

In response, Mykolaiv Mayor Oleksandr Senkevych said that the powers and role of district administrations are very important today, especially in times of war, and therefore it was decided to return to the issue of their reorganisation after the war. Earlier, the mayor of Mykolaiv announced the reorganisation of district administrations for 2026 as the second stage of the structure reform, now focusing on the post-war period.

- "Today, administrations have a lot of work to do, including dealing with the aftermath of the arrivals and the war. We cannot make super-cardinal changes now, because the new structure may simply not function. That is why we decided to do it in stages. As I announced, the first stage will be to partially reform the administrations, and then, when the structure of all the other administrations changes, we will reform them as well. This will probably be after the war. Because today, a structural unit such as an administration performs many functions. Among other things, they leave immediately after arrivals, set up a tent, inform residents, help with damage assessments, their economic department helps with the distribution of humanitarian aid, film, various aid items, and coordinates the work of the state architectural control to enter data into the state register of damaged and destroyed property. Moreover, mobilisation measures: today we are taking over a large number of the TCC's powers, including the notification of the mobilisation of persons liable for military service. And today we simply cannot physically liquidate them. That's why we decided to do it in the second stage. And now, for now, we are reforming all other structures, which are not so risky to reform," said Senkevych.

However, some of the powers of the city's district administrations will be lost during the first stage of the reform. In particular, as explained by Andriy Volkov, the executive committee's chief of staff, the children's service at district administrations will become a structural unit of the Mykolaiv City Council's Children's Service.

In addition, the functions of cleaning green areas have already been transferred from administrations to the municipal enterprise «Mykolaiv Parks», which has been given responsibility for all green areas in Mykolaiv.

- Previously, the Department of Housing and Communal Services held tenders for the maintenance of green areas, individual parks and squares, and the district administration held its own tenders. Now, a single balance holder of all green areas in Mykolaiv is being determined - ME «Parks». This function has already been transferred from administrations to MEs. And in principle, by the end of this year, MEs will be in charge of all districts except Ingulskyi. The task was as follows: they increase the number of employees and equipment. But for those districts where they don't, they put out tenders, and companies come out and mow the leaves or do something else interesting. And we are freeing ourselves from this. And we switch to the balance holder of green areas, Parks," explained Oleksandr Senkevych.

"As for the cleaning of illegal dumps, which were also the responsibility of district administrations, these functions are being transferred to the municipal enterprise «Mykolaivkomuntrans».

- We have an enterprise, Mykolaivkomuntrans, which is responsible for the removal of solid waste in the city. It is also responsible for cleaning the areas near the garbage cans, removing bulky waste in large containers «and boats». Therefore, it was decided that a single enterprise - «Mykolaivkomuntrans»- would be responsible for all household waste, removal and cleaning of the sites. It is responsible for collection, removal, processing and disposal," said Oleksandr Senkevych.

At the same time, the mayor said that the administration still remains the customer for road repairs in the private sector, although he had previously announced the transfer of these powers to «»

- At the moment, we have not changed anything in this direction. This remains with the administrations: design, repair and construction of roads in the private sector and intra-quarter passages," said Oleksandr Senkevych.

As a reminder, the draft decisions of the Mykolaiv City Council on streamlining the structure of executive bodies, liquidation, merger and renaming of departments is only the first step towards a complete reform of the Mykolaiv City Hall. The issue of introducing an additional position of Deputy Mayor for Digitalisation and reducing the powers of district administrations, which are still budget managers, is planned for the next stage.

According to the plan of Mykolaiv Mayor Oleksandr Senkevych, if the city council session on 28 August adopts the proposed decisions to approve and streamline the structure, all changes, including mergers, liquidations, and re-registrations of structural units, should be implemented by the end of the year.

Back in April, Mykolaiv Mayor Oleksandr Senkevych presented a draft of the new structure of executive bodies, which was developed in accordance with the recommendation of the Ernst & Young audit. The new structure envisages a reduction in the number of key spending units, liquidation and consolidation of departments. At the same time, the mayor's office is not yet able to say how much the number of executive body officials and their maintenance costs will be reduced. As of today, an internal audit unit has already been created, departments have been merged, and new regulations for the work of the updated bodies have been prepared.

Earlier it was reported that Mykolaiv Mayor Oleksandr Senkevych believes that deputies should not combine representative and executive functions, and therefore should not hold senior positions in the executive bodies of the city council.

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