Representative Office of the European Association of Local Democracy Will Be Opened in Vinnytsia: City Council Submits Official Application

During the official signing, Halyna Yakubovych noted that one of the powers of the Executive Committee of Vinnytsia City Council is to cooperate with the public, including NGOs and active Vinnytsia residents. This allows them to make joint decisions aimed at the development of Vinnytsia community.

"In 2012, the city council launched a program to provide financial support to civil society institutions for the implementation of social and cultural projects. Over the years, public associations together with the executive bodies of Vinnytsia City Council have implemented 128 ideas in Vinnytsia City Territorial Community," the deputy mayor said.

Svitlana Yarova, a member of the city council, also reminded that since 2018, the Misto Zmistiv HUB has been operating in Vinnytsia, where various events of civil society and government agencies are held free of charge for visitors.

"To administer the premises and facilitate a dialogue between the government and the community, the NGOs formed the CSO Network "Misto Zmistiv", which, together with the Civil Society Development Division of the Institute for Urban Development, manages the HUB and plans events. Currently, the union unites 57 civil society organizations. "In the first quarter of 2023 alone, we held 91 different events here," adds Svitlana Yarova. "We are also in the process of creating a project office of the city council, which will be engaged in fundraising for projects for which the city council cannot allocate budget funding due to martial law. This is an important element of partnership with organizations like ALDA."

Representatives of the city council thanked ALDA specialists for their interest in working with Vinnytsia community. And the Office, which is planned to open in the near future, will make cooperation even more fruitful and provide more opportunities to attract international and foreign donors to implement socially important projects.

ALDA Secretary General Antonella Valmorbida named three priorities for their organization's work in Vinnytsia. These are:

• participatory democracy (a combination of direct and representative democracy),
• digitalization,
• civil society, and community empowerment.

"The main goal of our association is to promote good governance and citizen participation at the local level. For the sake of effective governance and citizen engagement at the local level, ALDA deals with issues such as: European integration, decentralization, civic initiatives and volunteerism, human rights and sustainable economic development," says Antonella Valmorbida. "Every day we develop projects with our members to support their activities for the benefit of the entire community. We are experts in identifying all possible means (EU funds, partnerships, philanthropy, etc.) to ensure that our work and the work of our members is possible."

ALDA unites over 350 members from more than 40 countries and operates in most of the European Union and European neighboring countries.

Vinnytsia City Council's application to join the Association will be considered in June at a meeting of the European Association of Local Democracy's governing board.