The Association of Local Self-Government Bodies of Kharkiv Oblast appealed to the Oblast Council and the Oblast State Administration on the necessity of creating a working group in the oblast to draft changes to the administrative-territorial structure of the Kharkiv Oblast. In this case, it will be a pilot set of draft changes in Ukraine.

The appeal says that almost all rural, settlement, city and rayon councils, amalgamated hromadas consider it necessary to return to the consideration of draft laws “On the Principles of the Administrative-Territorial Structure of Ukraine” and “On the Procedure for the Establishment, Elimination of Rayons, Establishment and Change of their Borders”.

“In general, we support these draft laws and consider their implementation very relevant as a part of the reform of local self-government and territorial organisation of power. We are aware that in order to achieve this goal, it is necessary to unite (consolidate) existing rayons of the oblast. There may be a lot of options for such an amalgamation, but historical, economic, environmental, geographic, logistic, demographic and other features, as well as cultural traditions, must be taken into account. However, the main thing, in our opinion, is ensuring the management of the territories concerned,” the appeal reads.

Therefore, in order to thoroughly elaborate the scheme of the future administrative-territorial structure of the KharkivOblast, the participants of the General Meeting of the Association of Local Self-Government Bodies appealed to the Oblast Council and Oblast State Administration with a proposal to agree on the first in Ukraine pilot set of draft changes in the administrative-territorial structure of the oblast.

Representatives of local councils are convinced that support of the draft set will be the basis for sustainable and balanced socio-economic development for almost 3 million residents of the Kharkiv Oblast.