In frames of project “institutional dialogue with executive, legislative and judicial authorities” organization the “Young Barristers” held a meeting with parliament minority candidate of Tbilisi Mayor – Giorgi Vashadze.
In the frames of the institutional dialogue, the organization talked about most of the active issues of municipal policy, discussed the code of self-governments and its influence on inclusion of citizens, course of social and infrastructural projects, a plan of Tbilisi city development, putting touristic opportunities of the city in motion, architectural and transport policy in the city, problematic sides of housing, priority of local population in the process of acquiring city budget, issues of protecting recreational zone of Tbilisi and an importance of political will for local self-government for its future effectiveness. In addition to this, a subject of discussion was evaluation of past four years of activities of Tbilisi City Hall, identification of displayed problems and content of initiatives to be implemented in case Giorgi Vashadze is elected.
According to the evaluations of Giorgi Vashadze, it is important to release loca self-governments from centralized governance, they must be given more financial autonomy and the city must be given a real decentralization of self-governments.
“It is important to find citizens actually the participants of the process of implementing local self-governments. A project of fellowships was nice, but it never achieved to fully include the society in the decision making process. To us it is a priority to implement projects, where people themselves will make decisions according to what they need for the city and district. We have an idea of creating district advisories, strengthen neighborhood relationships in order to find citizens discussing their needs and ways of solving problems. There are various problems in Tbilisi, among them unfinished constructions, traffic jams, negligence of the green line, not consideration of real interests of the citizens in the process of implementing social programs, while my election priorities will be an offer of service standards to the society. Criteria of financing various issues must be overviewed. A public transport must be upgraded as well. Tbilisi city hall has had many more chances to set up reforms, but a lot of successful steps were taken as well. It is nice, when totally new faces express a desire to be included in municipal policy. We set up an inner democracy in the “United National Movement”, while the party was made up of a group which decided who was supposed to be working and on what position. Now it is all about competition” – said Giorgi Vashadze at the meeting with the “Young Barristers”.
For your information: In frames of the project, it was a fifth meeting held by the organization. The project was set up in August and it aims to raise awareness of society towards executive, legislative and judicial institutions, transparency of public authorities and continual relationship with the society. The organization in frames of the project will hold meetings with other candidates of Tbilisi Mayor, among them with David Narmania, who was appointed on a position of Tbilisi City Mayor by the current government.
