Over the past two years, Ukraine has been actively implementing reforms to its Public Investment Management (PIM) system, which is set to become one of the key instruments for its recovery and development. The reform aims to ensure the most efficient use of limited financial resources by directing them towards projects that meet the strategic priorities of the state, regions and communities.

In addition, the reform objectives include the following: 1) harmonising strategic and medium-term budget planning to strengthen the role of strategic documents for communities; 2) introducing a transparent and well-founded mechanism for selecting and prioritising investment projects based on socio-economic effectiveness and compliance with strategic documents.

This is why the PIM reform acted as a kind of ‘test’ for the quality and relevance of local strategic documents. When preparing their Medium-Term Plans for Promising Public Investments (MTPPPI), communities realised that approved Development Strategies and Action Plans were not only important for implementation, but also had to be relevant and consistent with the community’s strategic priorities and tasks. Therefore, to form an effective MTPPPI, financial resources must be clearly linked to the community’s strategy objectives and the priority development projects for which it plans to attract public investment must be understood.

Why have so many communities experienced the situation where strategic documents have become obsolete?

The main reason for this is the inadequate development of systematic monitoring practices for the implementation of strategies and action plans. For most Ukrainian communities, the strategic planning process typically concludes with the approval of strategic documents by the local council. However, a small number of communities understand the importance of strategic documents and are taking a different approach by creating committees and working groups to implement strategies. Communities in which these consultative and advisory bodies actually function, regularly analysing the results and problems of strategy implementation, monitoring progress, drawing conclusions, and developing proposals for necessary changes, can be considered exceptions.

How can communities ensure that their strategic documents remain relevant?

The solutions here are very straightforward.

Firstly, begin implementing the strategy seriously. Secondly, monitor the implementation of strategic documents regularly. Thirdly, amend the relevant strategic documents as necessary.

What is strategic document monitoring, and how can communities implement it effectively?

First, some background information.

In line with the Methodological Recommendations on the Procedure for Developing, Approving, Implementing, Monitoring and Evaluating the Implementation of Local Community Development Strategies, the Strategies are monitored annually by comparing baseline and actual indicator values, while the Action Plan is monitored twice yearly by tracking the implementation of specific indicators to assess project and measure effectiveness. Reports based on the results of this monitoring are prepared and submitted to the relevant local council for consideration, and are published on its official website.

To ensure the effective management and high-quality monitoring of strategic document implementation, the community should establish an appropriate consultative and advisory body. This body should comprise representatives from local government, the public, businesses and civil society organisations. If this body operates effectively, rather than just formally, continuous monitoring of the strategy’s implementation will provide honest answers to important management questions, such as:

• Do the results obtained from their implementation (changes in the community) correspond to the declared goals?

In other words, monitoring is not so much about meeting numerical targets as it is about discussing changes in the community, their impact and why certain goals have not been met. Above all, it is about making decisions about future actions.

Therefore, it is important that monitoring is carried out by a consultative and advisory body involving all interested parties, rather than by one person (or department), so that the results obtained and recommendations made are recorded in an accessible report for residents. This is one of the steps that can be taken to build trust in the community. This approach will allow the relevance of strategic documents to be monitored in the community and signal the need for them to be adjusted if necessary.

‘To be honest, for our community, the implementation of the Strategy itself is new, not the monitoring of it. After the previous strategy was developed, no one referred to it again. This time, however, everything is different. We adopted a pragmatic approach to creating the Action Plan for implementing the Strategy, including only measures and projects that we considered realistic. Perhaps our Plan seems ‘simple’, but the first year of implementation has already shown that this approach has its advantages. Firstly, we can see the planned measures being implemented in real life. In addition, the six-month monitoring of the Action Plan carried out by the Implementation Management Committee shows significant progress in implementing measures related to social and security issues. Unfortunately, our hopes for lower risks regarding development projects were too optimistic, so some of these will be postponed until 2026. Overall, this is new, interesting and very useful work for our community,’ said Vasyl Chebotar, Mayor of Kholmy.

 

How can strategic documents be amended or adjusted?

Current legislation does not clearly define the process for amending community development strategies and the associated action plans. According to the Methodological Recommendations, decisions on amendments to the Strategy must be submitted for consideration at the next session of the relevant council. Furthermore, the Regional State Administration must be informed of any such decisions. There is no regulation at all for amendments to the Action Plan.

At the same time, there must be valid reasons for making amendments.

Such reasons are the result of monitoring the Action Plan and are recorded in the relevant reports. The advisory body responsible for managing and monitoring the Strategy and Action Plan justifies the need to make changes to strategic documents (if such a need exists) in the report on the results of monitoring the Strategy or Action Plan.

On the one hand, it is necessary to update strategic documents to keep them relevant in these challenging times of change. However, the very essence of strategic planning requires consistency in the chosen priorities.

This balance is achieved by clearly distinguishing between the levels at which amendments are made. Strategic priorities, such as vision, strategic objectives and operational objectives, must remain stable over a long period. However, operational implementation tools, such as programmes, projects and measures, can be adjusted regularly.

Therefore, it is important to distinguish clearly between the processes of amending the Community Strategy and the Action Plan for its implementation.

Amendments to the Strategy.

The community development strategy is a regulated state planning document and the result of collective work. The mission, vision, values and key development directions it contains determine the basis of the community’s identity. This is why it is important that this document remains stable and that any amendments are carefully justified.

In light of the significant changes and new challenges posed by the war, many Ukrainian communities decided to revise their development strategies. However, it became apparent during this process that the amendments often only concerned tactical decisions. For example, while the goal of providing children in the community with quality educational services remained relevant, new needs arose due to the circumstances. Therefore, new ways of achieving this goal were required, such as the construction of civil defence structures (bomb shelters) in the community’s general secondary schools. Such changes are tactical in nature and can be implemented by either adjusting the task to the operational goal or adding a project to the Action Plan to implement a specific task. These changes can be made in accordance with the procedure for amending the Action Plan (see below).

However, if the changes relate to strategic or operational objectives, such as a coal community deciding to transition to a green economy and changing its specialisation, this is a strategic change. The process of implementing such changes is comparable to Strategy development and involves all the stages specified in the Methodological Recommendations, from deciding to amend the Strategy, to publicly discussing it and submitting it to the local council for consideration.

In other words, the process must be started again from the beginning.

The full process of developing or updating the Strategy is lengthy and complex. However, it helps to prevent ‘imbalances’ when documents are amended merely to suit the political situation.

If the Community Development Strategy is a strategic planning tool, then the Action Plan is a tool for implementing it. It allows for greater flexibility and can be adjusted more frequently in response to the current situation or new challenges.

What is the process for amending the Action Plan?

Step 1. At its regular session, the local council reviews the report on the results of monitoring the Action Plan, after which it decides on the development of draft amendments to the Plan. This ensures that the amendments are well-founded.

Step 2. The committee/working group responsible for managing and monitoring the Strategy and Action Plan develops a draft amendment to the Plan and considers it at its meeting. These amendments may also be published on the local council’s official website and in the local media for public discussion. This makes the process more participatory and transparent for all stakeholders.

Step 3. It is important to note that, like any state planning document (SPD), the draft amendments to the Action Plan for the Implementation of the Community Strategy are subject to a strategic environmental assessment (SEA). However, if the proposed amendments to the SPD have previously undergone an SEA and can be classified as minor in accordance with paragraph 4 of the Criteria for Determining Environmental Impacts including on Public Health, as approved by Order of the Ministry of Environment No. 213 dated 28 October 2020, the local government customer shall indicate this in the SEA scoping statement and may decide not to carry out an SEA for these amendments based on the recommendations of the relevant authorities.

However, carrying out a full SEA is required for significant amendments to the Action Plan.

Step 4. The final stage is to submit the draft amendments to the Action Plan to the local council for consideration.

This year, the Mozolevske rural community conducted its first monitoring of the implementation of the Action Plan for the Development Strategy. The Working Group on Strategy Implementation and Monitoring carefully reviewed each project in the Action Plan in terms of its implementation, the feasibility of changes to financing and implementation deadlines, and the nature of the project activities. It transpired that only a few projects were being implemented according to the specified plan. Therefore, most projects required amendments regarding financing and implementation deadlines. The Working Group also recommended that the village council add a project to develop a comprehensive spatial development plan for the Mozolevske community territory for 2026–2027 to the Action Plan.

 

So, what is received in the result?

The PIM reform has shown that the Development Strategy and Action Plan are not documents to be left on the shelf, but rather active tools for community development. Constant monitoring, transparent procedures for making amendments and active resident participation ensure these documents remain relevant while keeping the community’s strategic goals in focus. Clear algorithms for amending the Strategy and Plan help communities to develop a systematic approach to development management and to make the necessary management decisions flexibly. This is particularly relevant when it comes to financing projects and activities.