Odesa spent a billion on landscaping: what's behind the numbers

Odesa's 2025 budget for public amenities envisages significant expenditures, the bulk of which are concentrated in the Department of Municipal Economy. Analysis of the documents shows significant discrepancies in the indicators and scope of work that require additional explanation from the city authorities.

This is the second part of the analytical material of the Center for Public Investigations on how budget funds for urban improvement were allocated in Odesa during the term of Hennadii Trukhanov in 2025.

The previous part discussed the principles of budget program formation and the first expenditures under code 6030. Now, the analysis focuses on the largest recipient of funds - the Department of Municipal Economy, which receives almost 80% of the funding for the "Organization of Improvement" direction.

This is the largest program within the 6030 code. Analysts compare the data from the budget program passport with the budget annexes and the target program for improvement to see the actual scope of work.

For road maintenance, the passport indicates only 900 km of the network, while the target program describes daily winter work on more than 4 million square meters, mechanized and manual cleaning, road washing, and maintenance of more than a thousand bus stops. Due to the different units of measurement, it is difficult to understand the true volumes, and the calculations sometimes exceed the actual area of the road network, which may indicate inaccuracies or overstatements.

A separate issue is the purchase of equipment for several municipal enterprises at the expense of the development budget. Although the purchase may be justified, there are no publicly available efficiency calculations comparing it to private contractors.

In the outdoor lighting block, most of the costs are for overhauls of networks and light points. The city maintains more than 52,000 light points for almost 200 million hryvnias, but additionally plans to purchase 25,000 light bulbs and 300 km of cable. Such volumes raise questions about the real state of the networks and the accuracy of the data.

As for other improvement facilities, the passport provides 70.7 million for 229 facilities without publishing their list. At the same time, the development budget provides for the repair of fountains, fire ponds, water closets, and even a restroom in Istanbul Park.

UAH 154.6 million has been allocated for green spaces, but the documents do not contain quantitative indicators of the scope of work. A separate item is allocated for the repair of a playground on Soborna Square for 4.4 million, an unusual item for this area.

Expenditures for the maintenance of 11 city cemeteries range from 36 to 39 million hryvnias, and another part of the funds is spent on the improvement of the Zakhidne cemetery. Almost UAH 35 million is planned for the energy sector, as well as equipment overhauls at a number of pumping and drainage stations.

The analysis then moves on to repairs financed from the deputy fund, which is a separate block that requires separate consideration.

In the first days of the full-scale invasion, territorial defense was supposed to be the mainstay of Odesa's defense. However, the decisions of the city authorities show that funding for the TRO was started late and later actually curtailed.

The analysis of the City Council's decisions, the mayor's orders, and the Treasury's data by the Center for Public Investigations shows how support for the TRO has become a formal procedure.

Анна Бальчінос