2011-09-26
Redistribution of Functions of County Governor’s Administrations
County Governors Administration institution was established in 1995; however already in 2001 a possibility to abolish Counties was discussed. For a long time there was no unanimous political decision concerning County Governor’s Administrations therefore counties were being reformed by reviewing some of their responsibilities within the scope of their competence. As a result, it was not possible to avoid duplication of functions and ensure satisfaction of population needs. Only in 2008 Seimas (Parliament) approved the Programme of the 15th Government which provided for abolition of Counties after having established regions and having redistributed Counties functions to municipalities.
Changes in public administration system ensuring more transparent management of the State and saving public resources were unavoidable and should be assessed positively.
Having set an ambitious goal – to abolish County Governor Administrations – the Government met considerable challenges. During one and a half years it was necessary to initiate amendments of 82 laws, to adopt changes of almost 200 resolutions, to evaluate if there was a need for continuing County Governor’s Administration functions, to redistribute Governor’s Administrations assets and offices. It is obvious that it was quite a task. The audit has evaluated what has been done in this area and has provided its recommendations with regard to improvements in order to ensure the utmost benefits of the reform.
Having abolished County Governor’s Administrations, 44 per cent of their functions were abolished, the rest were redistributed among other state governing institutions and municipalities. Monitoring of the County reform is not fully satisfactory. Government does not have sufficient information relating to redistribution of County Governor’s Administration responsibilities therefore in the future it will be difficult to timely tackle the problems as well as to evaluate if reform goals have been achieved and benefits gained.
Economy of budget resources will be achieved; however its size will not be as significant as is maintained by the Government. The number of abolished positions directly relating to redistribution of functions of County Governor’s Administrations is less that it is indicated by the Government therefore the economy of resources will also be less that it was planned. Real results and benefits of abolishing County Governor’s Administrations will be seen only in long-time perspective. Therefore in order to evaluate progress and gains, to tackle arising problems in a flexible way and to manage change we have provided recommendations for the Government – we propose to continue monitoring county reform and to carry out its ex post evaluation.
Evaluation of resources related to implementation of additional functions attributed to municipalities in the process of redistribution of County Governor’s responsibilities was not carried out; therefore not all the functions can be carried out properly. In order to ensure proper implementation of the function of ensuring control over the use of constructions of significant importance – the function that was transferred to municipalities - we have recommended the Ministry of Environment to evaluate implementation of the mentioned responsibility by municipalities and to envisage measures ensuring proper control over the use of those constructions in municipalities.
Public audit report is available in Lithuanian:
Redistribution of Functions of County Governor’s Administrations to Municipalities