Due to the full-scale war of Russia in Ukraine, many cities were destroyed, and the infrastructure of the survivors was significantly damaged. The enclaves retained after the administrative-territorial reform seriously complicated the work of military administrations (VA). For example, Slavutych, which was supposed to be annexed to the Chernihiv region, was surrounded by the invaders for some time, and coordination with the military of the Kiev region was significantly hampered..

In order to understand how the state plans to change the country’s administrative-territorial structure in the future, on what basis the country’s restoration and the development of communities will take place, and whether Ukraine will be rebuilt into a military state like Israel, Rukh CHESNO talked to the head of the Verkhovna Rada subcommittee on administrative. U.A..

- Vitaliy, the recent administrative-territorial reform did not concern the regions - their number and borders. Which area borders, given the already known information about the destruction, can be changed after the victory in order to strengthen the region?

- Such a correction is possible, but only after the military phase, that is, until the war is won, until Russia ceases to exist as a country that carries only aggression. This will be Pandora's box, which can be used by the aggressor. As for the procedure, it is not so simple.. For understanding, for a simple renaming of the Soviet name of the Kirovograd region, two sessions of parliament and 300 votes will be needed.

Looking ahead, I will say more. When the Kremlin’s puppets from the “DNR/LNR” began to make statements before February 24 about their recognition by Russia within the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, some colleagues had an idea to change the borders of the regions, transferring the territories controlled by Ukraine to, conditionally, Kharkiv or Dnipropetrovsk region. But when there is a thoughtless aggressor, we understand that he does not care about such decisions, and he will not comply with this..

In fact, where the greatest destruction is in the Donetsk, Luhansk, Kharkiv regions, it is necessary to correct the masses, not the borders of the regions. And we can talk about the boundaries of regions when there are some inclusions - enclaves or exclaves.

- The situation really needs to be addressed in terms of enclaves. Was it convenient in Slavutych - part of the Kiev region, interspersed with Chernihiv region, to coordinate their actions with the military administration? I remember that during the discussions in 2020, there was a question of joining Slavutych to the Chernihiv region.

- This is exactly the egregious example with which many warnings were associated. The community of Slavutich, in fact, was immediately cut off by Russian troops. It’s good that there were supplies of water, flour and other food, and the bulk was able to hold out.

Slavutych in the future will have to be assigned to the Chernihiv region in order to avoid such risks in the future. A lot of time should be devoted to this case, mechanisms should be worked out so that the community does not have economic and social problems. After that, find a consensus between the two areas.

If there is an understanding that it was not convenient for military administrations to work in such a configuration, then this may be subject to change.. But there are regional gaps in the regions of the rear.

– In fact, there are complaints from the residents of the enclave Kotsiubynske. There, territorial defense was to be coordinated through Kyiv with Irpen. I also know that when the districts were formed, there was a struggle between local clans, and the number of districts eventually became larger than expected.. What will happen to regionalization?

- The system of the district level, in my opinion, is imperfect. What we have now is the story in support of which there were votes in parliament. There are political concessions somewhere. It couldn't have been better in that situation.. Something needs to be done about existing gaps.. I believe that in the same Kiev region one district is superfluous.

— There was a discussion that we don’t need rayrads at all, just like the district state administration. What do you say in the new conditions, are these tools justified

- From the point of view of the control functions of the raid, then if it was minimized in peacetime, now it simply does not exist. We have adopted bill No. 7153 (unfortunately, it has not yet been signed), according to which all management is transferred to the military district administrations. It is necessary to make decisions quickly without any local politics, which, unfortunately, is born. Decision making should be centralized at all levels.

More powers should be given to VAs and heads of communities. And when we talk about the heads of communities, we mean the entire territory of Ukraine, and not just those areas where hostilities continue.. There is no place for political discussions or waiting for a quorum at the session in resolving the issue, there must be personal responsibility. The leaders in the west of Ukraine should resolve the issue with migrants, promptly direct funds to the Armed Forces of Ukraine.

The only exceptions were regional councils.. Regional councils function and do not transfer their powers to the VA until the moment (and let this never happen) the environment of the regional center. This was due to the situation in the Kherson region. There, the deputies of the regional council did not allow the KhNR to be proclaimed and made a tough pro-Ukrainian decision. But we understand that people endanger themselves physically, and here it is better that VA has all the powers.

- On what basis and when will the administrative-territorial structure be adjusted?

— We have a large number of internal migrants. Somewhere around three million migrants are abroad. And while we do not see that the situation with the resettlement of citizens has stabilized, it is too early to reschedule the device.

We need to understand whether our citizens will return to where they lived, or choose, for example, safer territories for their future life.. It is also important to understand who moved, for example, to the western regions and plans to stay there - is it the working class or pensioners. All this affects the viability of the territory in matters of management..

And you have to start doing your homework now.. But in terms of when these decisions will be made, I would not say anything yet.. We do not know how long the hot phase of the war will last.. We don't know what the political horizon will be. But within a year after the war, these decisions are quite feasible..

— How can the state systematize the needs of the population in housing, work?

- I hope that Deputy Prime Minister Mikhail Fedorov will help to make a kind of population census thanks to the application " But this census should be more detailed. For example, a resident of the east moved to the west of the country with his family and decided that he would not return. We know that he moved with his wife and two children who must attend kindergarten and school.. We know the profession of this citizen and his wife. All these data are needed in order to assess the situation.. I hope that such a survey can be conducted in the spring, and this data will help both the development of communities and the development of state policies..

- When can the law on the administrative-territorial structure amended by the war be adopted? Indeed, today the reform operates within the framework of the resolution of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine.

— I would prefer not to confuse these questions. The administrative-territorial unit itself is approved. When we talk about the law on administrative organization, we mean the government bill on resolving issues of the administrative-territorial structure No. 4664, it should be adopted in the first months after the war, because it will be a new foundation.

— The government has already allocated the first tranche for the restoration of a number of areas. Kyiv region, Chernihiv region, Sumy region received the most. On what basis these funds are distributed, and who controls these processes?

- A representative of Poland spoke in parliament, who emphasized: “Together we will restore what the Muscovites destroyed - even more modern and beautiful than it was”. Nobody will say the final amount of losses for infrastructure now, while the war continues.

But recently the first billion was allocated from the budget. These are definitely small funds, given the scale of destruction.. They will be used to restore damaged electrical networks.. Some areas were left without water supply and heating.

These networks need to be repaired so that people can return if the housing is not damaged.. And then we can talk about a systematic assessment and restoration of residential and non-residential stock.

Control the use of funds by military administrations. Now it is a key structure on the territory of each region and district. If we talk about such communities as Bucha, Gostomel, Irpen, then the state should take on the entire burden of restoration.

- When is it advisable to start the restoration of settlements so that they are not destroyed again during a possible next attack?

— The fact that there is and will be, and that investors want to invest more in the western regions of Ukraine, does not mean that there is no need to restore the Left Bank. We understand that it is not a fact that all the resettled residents will return, but restoration is planned. There are some caveats here.. Just building housing there will not solve the problems if there are no jobs and production.. In the absence of these components, rebuilt boxes risk turning into a ghetto.

In order to understand what can be restored, it is necessary to visit these territories and analyze. For example, last week we visited the Trostyanets community, where the local authorities are already engaged in the relevant analysis..

According to my subjective assessment, it is quite possible to restore this bulk and return it to normal life in less than a year, but everything depends on restarting production. Some of them in the territories of the community are seriously damaged..

- There are communities where the housing stock has survived, but the district center has not. Who will inform and when, in which community ambulance services will be provided, who will coordinate the launch of transport links in the regions, access to the police, courts?

- The key communicator everywhere is the military administrations, who have information about what is happening on their territory. If suddenly, for one reason or another, the reaction from the VA, which may have serious urgent tasks, that is, majoritarian deputies, there are deputies of the relevant committees, sags, pull us. We will turn on.

- What problems may arise or have already arisen with the local authorities with filling the budget in the Kyiv region, Chernihiv region, Sumy region, Zhytomyr region? How to solve these problems? To what extent, in general, is communication established with local authorities, whose budgets today bear the main burden?

- In principle, there was no economic activity on the Left Bank, because there were active hostilities, so there is no question of filling local budgets there. And even if we are talking about conditionally support or rear regions that have budget overfulfillment in March, we understand that there are several reasons for this. Part of the business has paid taxes in advance, activity has also increased due to immigrants, and somehow the economy is working. But budgets will begin to sag even here in May.

Local government can encourage businesses to come to their communities and start. Create living conditions for visiting specialists.

Then comes what's the problem? We had an alignment system before the war. Part of the profits were taken from the more prosperous communities and given to those who are poorer.

It is clear that now the system will not work according to this principle.. It is quite natural that now the regions of the west of Ukraine will subsidize the regions of the east of Ukraine. But it is necessary to give an opportunity to those communities that have accepted migrants and have an overfulfillment of the budget, to spend these excess funds for the repair of dormitories.

— What will happen to the subsidies and subventions that the state provided to the communities? How much will they remain Perhaps it makes sense to return to territorial communities the subvention for infrastructure development that existed for all united territorial communities in 2016-2019?

— It should be noted that an infrastructure subvention was also provided for 2022, five to six times the amount five years ago.. But the war changed everything. Of course, there will no longer be old approaches to massive subventions to communities, but there will be a new large-scale infrastructural restoration.

- Now there is an understanding that our territories from Volyn to Kherson region border on enemy countries. Is it supposed to introduce some kind of special regime (legal) for such territories?

— A year ago, we adopted a strategy for the development of the country until 2027, and there was a typology of territories. It seems to me that this document has lost its relevance..

The typology of territories should now be based on the security component, and not on the geographical or logistical. Then we quite organically get four types of territories. These are temporarily occupied territories where hostilities are taking place, conditionally stronghold territories are, say, Rivne and Zhytomyr regions or Chernihiv region, liberated from invaders. If we are talking about the northern territories, then these are the supporting territories. Here, investors will choose the south for investment, realizing that there is a border with Belarus.

And the rear areas are, for example, Lviv region. Such territories where internally displaced persons moved, enterprises were relocated. That is, they expect more economic activity here..

This is the typology that we plan to introduce at the legislative level in the coming weeks as amendments to the Law “On Regional Policy”.

And, of course, now there are temporarily occupied territories.

— Will Ukraine be rebuilt into a military state like Israel?

- Neighbors are not chosen. It so happened that next to us was and is an inadequate neighbor. Therefore, Ukraine must be ready, first of all, in terms of the speed of response and refocus on defense.

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