The Parliamentary Committee on the Organization of State Power, Local Self-Government, Regional Development and Urban Planning
has recommended that the Verkhovna Rada adopt in the second reading and as a whole the draft law on amendments to certain laws on expanding the powers of local governments to support the security and defense sector of Ukraine (No. 9559-d), the press service of the Verkhovna Rada’s apparatus reports.
The draft law proposes to amend the laws “On Local Self-Government in Ukraine” and “On Prevention of Corruption” to expand the powers of local governments to provide financial and material support to the security and defense sector during martial law or a state of emergency.
The draft law provides for empowering executive bodies of village, town and city councils to build, equip and maintain engineering and fortification structures.
According to the draft law, local authorities may approve local budgets and amend them, approve programs of socio-economic and cultural development, targeted programs on other local government issues, transfer funds in the form of intergovernmental transfers to the relevant local budgets in the event of temporary occupation of a territorial community and the failure to establish a military administration.
The draft law also provides for the possibility of appointing a village, town or city mayor to the position of head of the relevant military administration of the settlement(s) without dismissal. In addition, the draft law allows civil servants and local self-government officials who are on unpaid leave or in the event of downtime or suspension of their employment contract to be appointed to positions in other state and local government bodies, military administrations, and legal entities under public law.
The draft law also expands the organizational capacity of the leadership of regional and district councils under martial law in the event of a vacancy in the position of the chairman of such council.
The draft law also regulates the procedure for holding remote meetings of local self-government bodies.
The Verkhovna Rada adopted draft law No. 9559-d as a basis on April 11.
