Translated material
Governor's score
The Kaliningrad government has figured out how to evaluate the work of municipal leaders
In the Kaliningrad region, the regional government will evaluate local heads. No, municipal officials will not be seated behind their desks. Once a year, the regional cabinet of ministers will decide who worked poorly and who did well. The first, accordingly, will be given the “carrot”, and the second will be given the “stick”.The idea of forcing local heads, still elected by the population, to answer to the executive branch has been floating at the top of the regional government for a long time. At the end of last year, within the depths of the regional ministry for territorial development and interaction with local governments, a document was even born (later becoming a gubernatorial decree), according to which municipal leaders should be assessed and leaders encouraged. But then they could not finally decide on the basis of what criteria to evaluate the work of local heads? What should be considered a failure and what should be considered a success? For example, a large number of crimes being committed is, of course, bad. But this also testifies to the objectivity of the accounting - it means that there is no underestimation of data, everything is fair.
Recently, the Kaliningrad government decided to return to this difficult issue. The draft of the new “evaluation” resolution was presented by the “territorial” minister Mikhail Plyukhin. He said that 43 indicative indicators have been identified (arising from the powers of local importance), for the implementation of which officials will be asked. It is planned to rely on data from the regional department of state statistics, executive authorities and municipal administrations. Minister Plyukhin proposed to reward the best heads of municipalities with a personal bonus of 30 thousand rubles, and also to allocate up to 5 million rubles. from the regional budget for the preparation of design estimates for important local investment proposals.
During the discussion, it became clear that the data from the state statistics department arrives with a delay and is not enough. And at the local level, normal records are not kept at all. Where do you get the invoice for grading? This question remains open. Minister Plyukhin said that out of 43 indicative indicators, only 25 show the development of the municipality in dynamics, the rest are static. The head of the regional Ministry of Economy, Felix Lapin, then proposed to use these 25 “dynamic” indicators as a basis. The chairman of the council of municipalities, head of the Guryevsky urban district, Yuri Yukhtenko, for obvious reasons, supported the minister - the less paperwork local officials have to fill out, the easier it will be for them to work. But Governor Georgy Boos objected - in his opinion, the more indicators, the more objective the final assessment will be. He even proposed making a list of 150 points, on which the chapters would be graded using a binary system - zero or one. Whoever ends up with more points is the best. Mr. Yukhtenko did not object, making it clear that the community of municipal government leaders did not object.
Recently, the Kaliningrad government has taken a fancy to grading local leaders. In parallel with the draft “score” resolution, a credit rating of the region’s municipalities was developed - out of 22 districts and districts, a table was compiled that was the most reliable in terms of loan repayment. It is curious that the first place in this ranking was taken by the Svetlogorsk urban district, a municipal entity currently going through difficult times. The head of the district, Oleg Vernikovsky, was removed from office by the court, the status of the district was urgently changed to a district, and elections of local councils of deputies were scheduled. There is chaos in Svetlogorsk, but according to the regional government, banks should apparently be lining up to give local authorities loans.
By the end of May, Governor Georgy Boos plans to hold a large meeting at which he is going to find solutions to all controversial issues, and in June the final “evaluation” resolution should be adopted. Perhaps it will contain something that is not in the current document - if bonuses are provided for leaders, then how will lagging local heads be punished? Call them on the government carpet or initiate removal from office? But the head of the region already has such powers (they are provided by federal legislation), and there seems to be no need to fuss with points here. And is this necessary when there are enough real problems in the region, and not far-fetched ones - in connection with the desire to strengthen the regional power vertical.