On Monday, the Senate adopted, as the deliberating chamber, a bill launched in September by the Government to amend and complete GEO n.57/2019 on the Administrative Code, which allows the establishment of administrative consortia, reports Agerpres. The law also provides for special budget allocations for localities that join.
The law, which has yet to be enacted by President Iohannis, takes the first step towards territorial reform. This is the establishment of administrative consortia – the voluntary association between two or more neighboring localities, according to the project put up for public discussion. This change was taken over by Romania through the PNRR.
The bill aims to regulate the creation of a new cooperation/association mechanism between administrative-territorial units, through which administrative consortia are set up, without legal personality, which have a dual role: on the one hand, to ensure the some activities necessary for the exercise of the powers conferred by the law to the administrative-territorial units with insufficient administrative capacity and, on the other, to stimulate the associative phenomenon at the local public administration level and the transfer of unitary competences and practices.
It should be noted that these administrative consortia will not have legal personality.
The concept of “administrative consortia” appears in the PNRR to support reforms aimed at increasing the capacity of local public administration. One of the benchmarks that can be found in component 10 – Local Fund of the PNRR aims to amend the Government Emergency Ordinance No. 57/2019 on the administrative code governing the legal regime of the organization and functioning of administrative consortia.
Within the administrative consortium, other territorial administrative units that are components support the first, providing specialized personnel to fill the shortage of human resources and adequate skills, also ensuring an increase in the capacity to carry out public investment projects.
The law also provides budget funds for localities that join.
“To stimulate the cooperation of the administrative-territorial units in the administrative consortia, starting from 2024, the multi-year support program for the cooperation of territorial administrative units, members of administrative consortia, whose financing is ensured by the state budget, is established through the budget of the Ministry of Development, Public Works and Administration. Commitment credits and budgetary credits are provided for by the law on the state budget. The description of the multi-year support program for the cooperation of the administrative-territorial units adhering to the administrative consortia is approved by resolution of the Government, on the proposal of the ministry with powers in the field of public administration”, the scheme adopted by the Senate provides.
Many voices of civil society, but also of the political class, have insisted on an administrative reform that would lead to both a decrease in the number of municipalities and a decrease in the number of counties, precisely to make the expenditure of resources more efficient.
However, the idea of reform is rejected by PSD and PNL, especially at the local level, given that such a change would lead to the disappearance of powerful local barons, as well as hundreds of municipal and provincial councillors.
In recent years, there have been two attempts to unify neighboring localities to increase the efficiency of public services, one in Oradea and one in Buzău, both of which failed. This has so far been the only solution for collaboration between two locations.
