The Institute of Public Finance, which was an institutional partner of this year’s Local Government Congress in Mikolajki, organized the panel “Open Budget of Local Government.” In the panel, experts identified and assessed the barriers and challenges to greater citizen participation in overseeing the use of public funds. In the discussion, which was moderated by PhD Konrad Walczyk, an expert at the Institute of Public Finance, lecturer, and researcher at the Warsaw School of Economics, the participants were:
- Jacek Lelek, mayor of Stary Sącz city and municipality
- Grzegorz Benedykciński, mayor of Grodzisk Mazowiecki municipality
- PhD Slawomir Dudek, president of the Institute of Public Finance,
- Mateusz Klupczynski, CEO of Publink,
- Agnieszka Libudzka, journalist, and manager of the Olsztyn branch of the Polish Press Agency.
During the panel, the results of the pilot stage of the study of transparency of local government finances were presented.
“The publication of information on contracts entered into by local governments is a step in the right direction, but not enough. For citizens to have a real opportunity to control local budgets, then, first of all, this information must be developed and presented in such a way that it is possible to search, filter, view, compare, download, etc. in a way that is convenient for its user. We will examine the contract registers provided by local government units according to these criteria.” – PhD Konrad Walczyk of IFP, co-author of the study, explained.
Transparency of public finances at the level of local governments, which are, as PhD Slawomir Dudek put it, “on the front line,” is crucial to achieving transparency at the national level.
If politicians, decision-makers at the central level are tempted to take money out of the budget and divide it non-transparently, then let’s make an agreement that this also exists in local governments.” – explained Dr. Slawomir Dudek, President of the Institute of Public Finance.
This is just the beginning of our activities related to local governments, so look forward to IFP at future conferences!
