Experts from Transparency International Ukraine's Transparent Cities program have analyzed the draft new version of Kyiv's territorial community Charter. They have set out recommendations on the provisions that govern resident participation and the openness of the city government.  Overall, the draft reflects key legislative amendments and could serve as the basis for the final version of the Charter. However, a number of provisions require further refinement.

The current Charter of Kyiv's territorial community was adopted back in March 2002 and largely fails to comply with current legislation on local self-government and public engagement.

On June 18, 2026, Transparency International Ukraine called on the Kyiv City Council to bring the Charter into line with current rules. In response, the City Council reported that, by a mayoral order of June 2, a working group had been set up to prepare a new version of the document.

Transparent Cities analyzed the drafted document with respect to resident engagement, accountability, and access to information.

What is worth keeping in the draft

The draft new version of the Charter generally reflects key legislative changes and takes a more democratic approach than the current document.

In particular, it regulates in greater detail:

• reporting by local self-government bodies and officials to the territorial community;
• reporting by Kyiv City Council members;
• access to information on the activities of the city officials;
• the opportunity to take part in meetings of local self-government bodies.

It was on some of these very issues that Transparency International Ukraine had previously drawn the City Council's attention to the need for change.

What is recommended for refining  

The experts identified six issues that the working group should reconsider before approving the final text.

1. Drop the separate concept of “inhabitant”
   Alongside the statutory concept of “resident,” the draft introduces a category of Kyiv “inhabitants” — including people who work in the capital, own real estate here, or pay taxes to the city budget. However, the Law of Ukraine on Local Self-Government in Ukraine does not establish such a legal status. In effect, the Charter creates a new category of persons with its own set of rights, which may conflict with the law.
2. Revise the list of rights of Kyiv residents
   Some of the rights that the draft defines specifically as rights of members of the territorial community actually belong to all citizens regardless of their place of residence. These include, for example, the right to appeal to government authorities, to attend open meetings, and to review draft decisions.
3. Do not define electronic petitions as a form of territorial-community participation
   The law defines an electronic petition as a special form of collective appeal by citizens. Any citizen may submit or support one, regardless of whether they belong to a particular territorial community. Its legal nature therefore differs from the forms of local democracy defined by law.
4. Regulate the holding of general meetings of residents more fully
   The draft does not account for all the parties that legislation allows to initiate general meetings or a conference of residents. It also fails to specify the minimum number of people required to form an initiative group.
5. Clarify the mechanism for considering the results of public hearings
   The draft provides that proposals arising from hearings will be considered by the relevant structural unit of the Kyiv City Council's executive body. Yet the Law on Local Self-Government in Ukraine allows for them to be considered by the city council at a session. The list of bodies authorized to act on hearing results should therefore not be artificially narrowed.
6. Enshrine key participation procedures directly in the Charter
   The draft proposes that some of the rules on general meetings, local initiatives, and public hearings be set out in separate decisions of the Kyiv City Council. Yet the law expressly requires that these procedures be governed by the charter of the territorial community itself. This matters so that the core rules of participation are stable and clear and do not depend on the adoption of additional acts.

Why this matters

The new Charter should establish clear rules for interaction between the city government and Kyiv residents. In particular, it should clearly regulate the mechanisms of public participation, openness, and accountability: general meetings, local initiatives, public hearings, and reporting by officials. 

The importance of clear reporting rules is well illustrated by the situation surrounding the petition for open public reporting by Kyiv mayor. Kyiv residents supported it, yet since the spring of 2026 the city government still has not determined the format of Vitalii Klychko's meeting with the community, the procedure for resident participation, or the date on which it will be held. Procedures spelled out in detail in the Charter could reduce the room for such uncertainty and delay.

The draft prepared by the working group can serve as the basis for a strong new version of the Charter. To that end, Transparent Cities recommends removing the legal inconsistencies and enshrining the procedures for public engagement and accountability as fully as possible within the document itself.

In the spring a petition for public reporting by Kyiv Mayor Vitalii Klychko to the community collected the required 6,000 votes. As of the end of August, preparations for holding the report are ongoing.