Municipal Board Members Spend Funds Allocated from the Budget

Nino Mshvidobadze, Guria

In accordance to the law, members of municipal boards do not get salaries. Only chairman, deputy chairman and chairmen of the board fractions receive salaries. Despite that, the municipal board passed resolution based on which 500 lari is transferred to each board member every month.

We were told at the chancellery that board members receive the money to implement their duties, to participate in the sessions, to execute orders of the chairman and his deputy and to arrange meetings with voters. Head of chancellery Nino Dzidziguri said this rule does not work for the board chairman and his deputy.

We petitioned to the board chairman and requested to provide us with financial reports of each board member in order to find out where board members spend money allocated for the implementation of their duties.

The board chairman replied that Lanchkhuti municipal board does not hold similar information. He made verbal clarification about expenses.

“The allocated funds for the implementation of their duties are transferred to the board members to participate in board sessions, to meet voters, to execute orders of the board and its chairman. It is not a salary; it is funding to implement imposed duties. As you know, those people do not get salaries and if we do not pay them anything, they will have to spend their own money to attend board sessions. The local budget shall eradicate this problem, so we estimated the limited amount of the sum and they receive 500 lari per month,” said board chairman Amiran Gigineishvili.

As for financial reports, Gigineishvili said previous municipal board did not have practice of reporting.

How legal is it when board members do not report on the expenditure incurred for the implementation of their duties? Why should not we know where our delegates spend budget money? Or why should a majoritarian deputy of Atsana village (that is located too far from the district center) and deputy from Gvimbalauri village (three kilometers away from the district center) receive equal funding? We asked these questions to Tamaz Trapaidze, head of the Guria regional office of the Georgian Young Lawyers’ Association.

“As we know, board members do not get salaries unlike several senior officials of the municipal board. Unfortunately, we often heard complaints from the board members (particularly from majoritarian deputies): why do not we get salaries?”

Apparently, deputies did not know the law even during pre-election campaign and took part in it. Finally, their activity had a result and received some financial benefit too that is called “expenses for the implementation of the board member’s duties.” The board estimated the amount of the sum without any verification. Why is it 500 lari and not more or less; majority of self-governmental bodies did not have clarifications about this resolution (though the law requires clarifications for all normative acts), where the motivation of fixing the sum was to be verified.

As for calculation, expenses for the implementation of duties are not a salary and a person can spend according to his/her decision. The money shall be spent on the implementation of the board member’s duties. Consequently, board members shall calculate their expenditures and the rules shall be worked out by the board. The report shall provide information about expenditures for concrete events. Besides, both financial and narrative report shall be provided to any person if he gets interested in it in accordance to the General Administration Code,” Trapaidze clarified.

Despite all that, we still do not know whether Lanchkhuti municipal board will adopt rule for the financial reporting. Instead, we know that board members additionally receive phone-cards every month – board chairman received phone cards for 80 lari, deputy chair – 60 lari and other members of 40 lari.