Transparency International Ukraine’s analyst Bohdan Baliuk has analyzed how city councils inform residents about shelters. The information was prepared based on a new study on the transparency of city councils.

Thus, of the 70 cities studied, 63 published the corresponding data (as of January 2023), which is a high indicator, but in war conditions, all city councils must update the data and inform about it.

There are no official lists of shelters in the following cities: Izmail, Zhovti Vody, Konotop, Pavlohrad, Horishni Plavni, Kremenchuk, Poltava. But such information could be published by other authorities — regional military administrations or regional departments of the SES. In some cases, city councils published information only in 2023, which was not included in the analysis period. A detailed interactive map with information on all the studied cities can be found here.

Chernivtsi, Kamianets-Podilskyi, Ternopil, and Cherkasy city councils were noted as exemplary in the study. These municipalities not only published lists of shelters, but also put them on Google Maps. And this allows determining which shelter is the closest, its open hours, which protection type it is, whether there is unhindered access to it. Thus, in Kamianets-Podilskyi, the map was viewed almost 700,000 times, although the population of the city is about 100,000 people. And Ternopil City Council created a map with shelters and integrated it into a special application E-Ternopil.

Only 49 city councils out of 70 ensured that these data were updated at least once every 6 months. Updating these data is important because you need to regularly delete irrelevant information from the map, notify about new shelters, update information on balance holders, and use as many sources of information disclosure as possible — the website of the city council, city applications, official pages of the city in social networks, geoportal.

Information about shelters is critical for the population during the war. It is not just useful for residents of cities, but also saves their lives during shelling. That is why we urge municipalities to pay enough attention to this issue and properly inform citizens about shelters!