In an effort to advance the governance and decentralization reforms, the network of centers for administrative services is being expanded. Officials present the reform roadmap.
Additional 240 centers for the provision of administrative services need to be established in Ukraine. Ninety-four of them have to be located in amalgamated territorial communities. It is going to make administrative services more accessible in terms of time to 5,5 million citizens. These are the results of the analysis made in 25,5 thousand cities. “Should this plan be implemented, we expect that less than one percent of the population will have to spend more than 30 minutes to access the services. […] In a few years there will be about one thousand centers for administrative services,” said Maksym Nefyodov, First Deputy Minister for Economic Development and Trade of Ukraine at a press-briefing at Ukraine Crisis Media Center.
Pavlo Ostapenko, the expert of the Office of Administrative Services Reform, said that Ukraine sees about 10-15 administrative services centers appear quarterly. “Still they are set up in a chaotic manner,” he added. Maksym Nefyodov noted that 1,2 million people are spending over 30 minutes to get to the centers. Volodymyr Semenikhin, Head of the Office of Administrative Services Reform, emphasized that the remoteness of the centers for administrative services is a challenge for 40 percent of the rural population. Pavlo Ostapenko added that the future centers for administrative services will be divided into categories. He said that in towns that are located far from the centers for administrative services there will be designated civil servants – administrators of the centers to perform these functions.
Head of the Office of Administrative Services Reform said that in addition to expanding the network of the centers for administrative services based on the territorial criterion, it is planned to enhance the standards for the provision of services as well as the efficiency of the operational process by 2020. He said that the work of the centers for administrative services in Lutsk and Rivne is exemplary. Waiting time as well as the time for the service provision itself does not exceed 30 minutes altogether. Semenikhin also said that it is planned to actually increase the number of services rendered from 50 to 300. It is also planned to establish the system for customers’ feedback and evaluation within the centers.