Project Title: IMC2 (Inter-municipal cooperation for efficient service delivery)

Location: Veles and Caska; Tetovo and Brvenica

Short Description:

Project’s main objective was to promote inter-municipal cooperation as an effective approach to deliver public services and to support good governance for development.

The project activities had been structured to first address local organizational deficiencies and then enable creation of favorable environment for inter-municipal cooperation. The project activities were focused in creating of the conditions for undisturbed implementation if the IMC agreements the area of tax collection and administration in the municipalities of Veles and Caska as well as Tetovo and Brvenica.

Corporate thematic area: Decentralization

Status of the project: Completed

Donor and Budget: UNDP-Governance Thematic Trust Fund

Period of the project: September 2007 – September 2008

UNDP Programme Officer: Mihaela Stojkoska

Achievements:

• Establishment of initial cooperation arrangements with the Mayors in order to establish inter-municipal cooperation between municipalities Caska and  Veles as well as Brvenica and Tetovo;

• Based on analysis and in close cooperation between the UNDP and the said municipalities, tax administration area was selected as a field of intervention;

• ICT evaluation in municipalities Caska and Brvenica was conducted in order to assess the existing capacities and provide recommendations for improvement of ICT capacities in area of tax administration in order to enable unlimited electronic flow of information and documents between the partnering municipalities;

• IT equipment was purchased and establishment of wireless network between the targeted municipalities initiated.

• Tax administration client software installed in the Municipalities of Brvenica and Caska, tested and put into operation. Web-site for the municipality of Brvenica developed and hosted;

• IT training for 30 employees of the municipalities of Brvenica and Caska;

• Support provided for update of the taxpayers databases through the process of registration of real estate in the municipalities:

°          A promotional campaign implemented (video material produced and broadcast, promotional materials distributed) in order to inform the citizens and obtain their support for the process of registration of real estate;

°          Four commissions per municipality to determine the market value of the real estate constituted;

°          Methodology for update of taxpayers database developed;

°          3-day training on field collection of data, methodology for evaluation of property, tax administration and tax collection delivered for participants from the four municipalities;

• Comprehensive registration of 2700 taxpayers in the municipality of Caska and 3700 in the municipality of Brvenica completed and municipal taxpayers registers updated in the period of September 2007 – December 2008;

• Study visit to Bulgaria carried out for representatives of partner municipalities, attending forum for IMC and utilization of the EU funds. Visits to several inter-municipal projects: electronic information exchange between municipalities of Blagoevgrad region, inter-municipal dump, models of inter-municipal cooperation in the area of the social services. Experiences gathered for possible IMC projects in social services.