Open to their own: how some councils in Pervomaiskyi district have confused access to finance

The audit revealed that not all communities in Pervomaiskyi district comply with the requirements for open publication of budgets for 2025. Some councils publish documents transparently, while others have made it difficult to access them through confusing websites or closed file formats.

The Center for Public Investigations continues to check how local councils in Mykolaiv Oblast comply with the law on publishing decisions on local budgets for 2025. This time, attention was focused on eight communities in Pervomaisk district. In most cases, the documents were found, although some websites proved to be a real challenge for users.

The law obliges councils to make budget decisions public and available in a machine-readable format. During martial law, such documents are approved by the heads of military administrations, and their orders have the force of council decisions, so they must also be made public, unless they contain classified information.

Despite the common requirements, the level of openness in different communities varies significantly. In Kamianomostivka village council, there are no problems with searching for documents - the archive of documents is structured and the files are available in appropriate formats. The situation is similar in the Arbuzyn village council, where the search is fast and all attachments can be viewed at once. In Myhiyivka community, documents are organized by year and date of session, which makes it easy to find the right decision.

On the website of Pervomaisk City Council, the search process is more complicated - there are no filters, so you have to browse the pages manually. However, the required document is published in its entirety, with all the annexes. The Syniukhynobridska community has also fulfilled the requirements, although the website navigation is not the most convenient.

In Vradiyivka village council, it is not difficult to find a decision, but all files are available only in PDF format, which does not meet the requirements of the Cabinet of Ministers' resolution on data openness. Kryvoozerska village council has posted archives of decisions on Google Drive, so they are formally available, but the search looks confusing and unstructured.

Most problems arose with the Blahodatne village council. Despite the presence of a section with an archive and a search engine, it was not possible to find a decision on the budget. The published document turned out to be only the minutes of the meeting without the text of the decision. The 'Budget' section contains only amendments, so there is no basic document.

Summarizing the results of the inspection, six communities of the district fully complied with the requirements of the law, one published documents in an inappropriate format, and one did not publish the decision at all. In most communities, the level of transparency can be assessed positively, but some technical shortcomings, lack of consistency or inappropriate formats still make it difficult for residents to access important financial information.

At the same time, the communities of Mykolaiv district differ in the openness of their finances. Out of 19 local councils, only 12 have published their budgets in full and in accordance with all requirements, while seven have not ensured transparency.

Анна Бальчінос