An important function of the Chamber of Regions of the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities under the President of Ukraine should be to balance different views on regional development. This was stated by President Volodymyr Zelenskyy during a meeting of the Chamber of Regions of the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities under the President, which took place in Dnipro.
The President noted that as of today, the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities unites 1,551 communities. He noted that due to decentralization, local communities receive more resources: powers, property, land, funds, but at the same time - have more challenges and risks.
"Strengthening local self-government does not mean weakening the unity and unitarity of our state. And any attempts, as well as thoughts about building a separate federal principality within the community at the expense of local property or local budget will be severely rebuffed, especially by our voters," said Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
According to the Head of State, one of the main functions of the upper chamber of the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities should be to balance different views and approaches to regional development, improve service quality, strengthen regional economies, attract real investment and create new jobs to improve living standards.
The President also called on the Congress to unite to implement the ideas of environmental protection in the framework of the Green Country project initiated by him.
"I want to offer the participants of the Congress a common goal - 1551 new parks. That is one new park in each community," said Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
For his part, Head of the Office of the President of Ukraine Andriy Yermak noted that the activity of the Congress is held within two chambers: the Chamber of Local Authorities, which met last week, and the Chamber of Regions, which met today in Dnipro.
"The uniqueness of this Congress is that it is created under the European model, and it is a platform with a direct communication of all branches of government - from a small UTC to the mayor of a city of millions, where everyone can ask any questions to the President of Ukraine, members of government," he said.
Andriy Yermak added: it is very important for the leaders of the regions to be "first of all top managers and only for a bit - politicians".
Deputy Head of the Office of the President of Ukraine Kyrylo Tymoshenko said that since last week's meeting of the Chamber of Local Authorities, the Presidential Office has received the first appeals from regional heads, heads of regional councils, UTCs, and they are already being processed.
"I would like to emphasize that all your proposals and decisions will be implemented through the decisions of the President, government and parliament. The Congress was created for this purpose. We do not replace any associations, but simply shorten the way to resolve the issues of any mayor or UTC," he said.
During the meeting, members of the Chamber of Regions outlined the most pressing issues. In particular, the issue of installing automatic weight and dimension control systems on the roads was raised.
In response, the President stressed the importance of installing Weigh-in-Motion road monitoring systems on highways, which should protect the repaired road surface from destruction.
"Let us not build one or two kilometers of roads this year out of the thousands you are building, but with this money we will put WIM everywhere. Otherwise we can find ourselves without roads," Volodymyr Zelenskyy said, addressing Infrastructure Minister Oleksandr Kubrakov.
For his part, the Minister of Infrastructure said that last year up to 50 WIM complexes were installed on the roads of Ukraine, and this year it is planned to install about 50 more across the country.
"This number will be enough to put things right," he said.
The participants of the meeting also spoke about the water supply of the east and south of Ukraine and the management of the regions in the regime of military-civil administrations.
