On 29 December, a new Administrative Service Centre was opened in the rural settlement of Chemerivtsi in the Kmelnytskyi Oblast, with the support of the Ukrainian and Swedish experts. Over 40 thousand hromada and rayon residents have received access to the high-quality administrative services, including the most popular ones, i.e. residents’ registration, social, land, local services, business and real estate registration services.

The U-LEAD with Europe Programme assisted the hromada in the institutional establishment of the ASC, premises’ reconstruction, equipment of the centre with furniture and modern technology with specialised software, as well as training of the personnel. The Administrative Service Centre of the Chemerovetska AH is one of the few in Ukraine joint ASCs, when the AH and rayon administration work together in one premises providing over 100 services.

This is the first joint ASC within the framework of the U-LEAD with Europe Programme that will work for both the hromada residents and the residents of the Chemerivtsi Rayon. There are 8 workplaces established in the settlement-rayon ASC, and 4 more administrators will provide services in the format of a remote workplace. The Chemerivtsi ASC has become another example of an effective partnership between a hromada and an international donor programme, allowing almost 40,000 AH and rayon residents to receive comfortable access to quality administrative services.

Susanna Dellans, Project Manager of the U-LEAD with Europe Programme’s Support to Improved Administrative Service Delivery, said: “Creating conditions for providing high-quality and accessible administrative services to citizens is one of the key tasks of the local authorities. We are very glad that the number of hromadas with the modern effective ASCs is steadily increasing. This is a significant step forward, and we are pleased that Sweden, together with the EU and other states, can join this process.”

Oleksandr Soban, head of the Chemerivtsi rural settlement council, noted: “I am grateful to the experts of the U-LEAD with Europe Programme for their support and contribution to the development of our hromada. Due to the best European practices, we will be able to improve the quality of administrative services provided to our residents. Hopefully, we will show a great result and will be able to share the experience of establishing a joint settlement-rayon ASC with other hromadas in the nearest future.”

On the eve of the opening, the residents were informed about the features of the ASC work, its advantages, rights and obligations of employees and consumers of services. The Centre is accessible to people with disabilities and has a children’s indoor play corner.

It is worth reminding that 26 ASCs will be opened in Ukrainian amalgamated hromadas within the framework of the U-LEAD with Europe Programme which aims at improving the delivery of local administrative services. The best practices for creating and improving the delivery of administrative services that are tested and implemented in the pilot hromadas of the inception phase will be applied to all ASCs to be opened or modernised within the next phase of the Programme. That is at least 600 ASCs by the end of 2020.