Odesa City Council Deputy Attendance: 21 MPs Perfect, 6 Below 50%

An average citizen does not always think about what the work of a local council deputy consists of. Most often, they see a deputy at a reception, other personal communication, or read news about the council session, but preparation for the plenary session during meetings of standing committees is no less important. After all, it is there that draft decisions are discussed, which are then voted on or not voted on by the deputies. Experts of the public campaign"Certification of Local Council Deputies" studied the attendance of deputies at meetings of standing committees, which covered the activities of 57 out of 64 deputies of the Odesa City Council.

During the fourth year of the Odesa city council deputies' term of office from November 2023 to November 2024, only six deputies attended less than half of the meetings of the permanent commissions: Oleksandr Edelman, Andrii Kislovskyi, Maryna Lozovenko, Oleksandr Matveiev, Viktor Naumchak , and Yurii Shumacher. While 21 MPs did not miss a single one.

Changes in the composition of the standing committees

Due to the numerous changes in the deputy composition of the Odesa City Council during the fourth year of its mandate, many transformations have occurred in the composition of the standing committees.

During the session on February 21, 2024, the first changes took place: Oleksandr Edelman was removed from the standing committee on housing and communal services. Instead, he became a member of the Commission on Culture, Tourism and International Relations.

There were also changes in the Commissions on Communal Property, Economic, Investment, State Regulatory Policy and Entrepreneurship. Two MPs were expelled from the committee due to resignation: Olena Korobkova and Vadym Tereshchuk.

Oleksii Yeremytsia, who had not been a member of any of the standing committees until then, was included in the Healthcare Commission and elected its chairman instead of MP Vitalii Sautenkov, who disappeared after February 24, 2022.

Serhiy Uzunov, who had not previously been a member of any of the standing committees, was appointed to the commission on ecology, emergency prevention and elimination of their consequences, communications and information technologies.

During the next session meeting of the Odesa City Council, held on April 24, 2024, the Standing Committee on Ecology, Emergency Prevention and Response, Communications and Information Technologies was dissolved. This was due to the fact that for a long time the commission could not continue its work due to the absence of some of its members - MPs who had stopped their work and left the country since the beginning of the full-scale invasion.

Instead, a permanent commission on emergencies and elimination of their consequences, ecology and digital transformation was formed. It included the following MPs: Mykhailo Karpenchuk, Ihor Batrakov, and Serhiy Uzunov.

During the session on June 26, 2024, two new MPs were appointed to the standing committees. Thus, Maryna Boyko, a deputy from the European Solidarity faction, joined the Standing Committee on Education, Sports and Cooperation with Public Organizations. MP Andriy Sharashidze from the Servant of the People faction became a member of the Standing Committee on Transport and Roads.

During the session meeting on September 18, 2024, MP Oleksandr Slavskyi from the Servant of the People faction, who also recently joined the Odesa City Council, was included in the Standing Committee on Communal Property, Economic, Investment, State Regulatory Policy and Entrepreneurship. He was also elected chairman of the commission.

The work of the standing committee on regulations, deputy ethics and corruption prevention has not yet been resumed. Currently, the only officially listed member of the commission is MP Olha Kvasnytska. The last meeting of the commission took place on November 24, 2021.

Attendance at meetings of the standing committees

Based on the information from the minutes of the meetings published on the deputy portal, as well as on the data of the city council provided in response to the request of the Odesa regional organization ofthe Committee of Voters of Ukraine, the experts analyzed how the deputies attend the meetings of their committees.

It is worth noting that the analysis of attendance does not include the permanent commission on spatial development, land management and regulation of land relations. This is due to the fact that as of 25.11.2024, only 22 minutes of meetings of this commission for the period from November 2023 to November 2024 were published on the council's official website and provided upon request.

At the same time, it was this commission that held the largest number of meetings during the fourth year of its mandate - 38. Therefore, it is impossible to assess the level of attendance of the members of this commission due to the lack of data.

Image: Public campaign "Attestation of local council deputies"

The second largest number of meetings per year was held by the standing committee on budget planning and finance, which held 35 meetings.

All other standing committees held between four and fifteen meetings during the year of their mandate.

Twenty-one MPs did not miss a single meeting of a standing committee during the fourth year of their term: Oleksandr Avdeev, Oksana Antonishak, Oleksiy Asaulenko, Maryna Boyko, Liudmyla Varavva, Olena Vododyuk, Oleh Etnarovych, Natalia Zhukova, Mykhailo Karpenchuk, Iryna Kutsenko, Lilia Leonidova, Levon Nikoghosyan, Petro Obukhov, Svitlana Osaulenko, Svitlana Popova, Roman Senyk, Eduard Stas, Serhiy Uzunov, Oleh Filimonov, Andriy Sharashidze, and Serhiy Shmatko.

Another 10 MPs have an attendance rate of 70% to 95%: Anastasia Bolshedvorova, Andriy Vagapov, Oleksiy Yeremitsa, Oleh Zvyagin, Oleksandr Ivanitskiy, Vasyl Ieremiya, Olha Makohoniuk, Tetiana Plaksiy, Oleksiy Potapskiy, and Dmytro Tantsiura.

Five MPs attended 50% to 60% of the meetings of the standing committees: Ihor Batrakov, Iryna Holovatyuk-Yuzephpolska, Vadym Morokhovskyi, Daria Rybak, and Oleksandr Sheremet.

Six MPs attended less than half of the meetings: Oleksandr Edelman, Andriy Kislovskyi, Maryna Lozovenko, Oleksandr Matveiev, Viktor Naumchak, and Yuriy Shumacher.

Two MPs did not attend a single meeting of the Standing Committee between November 2023 and November 2024 - Nikita Avdeev and Vitaliy Sautenkov. It should be noted that these MPs have not attended any sessional meetings since the beginning of the full-scale invasion.

Given that the analysis does not include the work of the Standing Committee on Spatial Development, Land Management and Regulation of Land Relations, the article does not indicate the percentage of attendance of members of this committee: Oleksandr Baiderin, Oleh Bryndak, Serhiy Danyliuk, Zhanna Mandrychenko, Serhiy Strashnyi, and Andriy Ternovskyi.

There are three MPs in the parliament who are not members of any of the standing committees: Bogdan Giganov, Volodymyr Kornienko and Ivan Semchuk. Two of them have not appeared in the city council since the beginning of the full-scale invasion - Bohdan Hihanov and Ivan Semchuk.

It is worth mentioning that according to paragraph 5 of Article 20 of the Law of Ukraine "On the Status of Deputies of Local Councils", "if a deputy misses more than half of the plenary sessions of the council or meetings of the permanent commission of which he is a member, or fails to comply with decisions and instructions of the council and its bodies without good reason, the relevant council may appeal to voters with a proposal to recall such a deputy in accordance with the procedure established by law".

Вікторія Собко