For twelve weeks, starting from April to August 2024, 12 selected teams representing Ukrainian municipalities underwent online training for monitoring and evaluating the Municipal Development Strategy and the Action Plan for its implementation as part of U-LEAD’s Support Programme.
The following municipalities joined the Programme: Vyhoda and Spas, Ivano-Frankivsk Oblast; Perechyn, Zakarpattia Oblast; Velyka Berezovytsia, Ternopil Oblast; Mliiv, Zolotonosha and Chervona Sloboda, Cherkasy Oblast; Yarmolyntsi, Khmelnytskyi Oblast; Baryshivka, Kyiv Oblast; Hurivka, Kirovohrad Oblast; Seliatyn, Chernivtsi Oblast; and Brusyliv, Zhytomyr Oblast.
The participants of the Support Programme worked on improving the system of targets and indicators of the goals and objectives of their Municipal Development Strategies. With the support of U-LEAD experts, they acquired the knowledge and skills needed to ensure proficiency in the use of strategy monitoring and evaluation systems, automation of these processes and adaptation of their own M&E system to new challenges and regulatory compliance.
The Support Programme was designed so that the participants could further integrate the obtained results into their management cycle for better performance of local self-government bodies. They also formed a vision regarding the need to update their Municipal Development Strategies and Action Plans for their implementation, adapting to changes and contexts of post-war development. The initiative also aimed to mobilise all those interested, primarily the local public, to participate in monitoring activities.
Together with the experts, at the seminars, workshops, as well as group and individual consultations, the participants of the Programme mastered the automated system for monitoring and evaluating the implementation of the Municipal Development Strategy and the Action Plan for its implementation, taking into account each municipality’s capacities, as well as two reports on the monitoring of these documents.
The urban municipality of Zolotonosha became one of those to receive support as part of the Programme of Monitoring and Evaluation of Municipal Development Strategies. Viktoriia Ostrohlazova, Head of the Forecasting and Municipal Development Department, summarised the work with U-LEAD experts as follows:
“Everything that U-LEAD does for our municipality is very useful. This Support Programme helped to remind everyone that we have a strategy and also put into perspective what elements of the Strategy were not being implemented or overlooked. With the Support Programme, we identified those measures that need to be removed from the document and pinpointed our strengths and weaknesses in the process of implementing the Strategy. In September, the Working Group and I will work out our weak points and directions. Then we will present a monitoring report at the meeting of the city council. In December, we plan to adjust and update the Development Strategy.”
The Yarmolyntsi municipality, Khmelnytskyi Oblast, started its cooperation with U-LEAD back in 2021. In 2022, it embarked on designing its Development Strategy, but the full-scale invasion meant that the project was suspended. The work on the document resumed in 2023. In February 2024, the strategy was approved until 2027. Iryna Drahomeretska, Head of the Economic Development and Investment Department of the Village Council, spoke about it:
“To ensure that the Strategy does not remain on paper only, we considered its implementation and oversight of the implementation of the priorities it sets out. We have applied to the Monitoring and Evaluation Support Programme to learn the tools for analysing strategic and operational objectives and measures. After participating in the Support Programme, the municipality will focus on the analysis and selection of technical tasks in strategic planning in order to evaluate their performance and efficiency.”