EGAP Program and the “Eastern Europe” Foundation: a decade of fruitful cooperation and achievements in the digitalization of the Lutsk City Territorial Community
At the Department of Administrative Services, a meeting took place between representatives of the Lutsk City Council and the Swiss delegation of the EGAP Program “E-Governance for Accountability and Participation.” The program is funded by the Government of Switzerland and implemented by the “Eastern Europe” Foundation, so representatives of the foundation and related projects (the UCORD Program and the Regional Development Agency), also joined the meeting. The purpose of the visit was to familiarize themselves with the results of the EGAP Program’s implementation in the Lutsk City Territorial Community and to discuss further cooperation.
The EGAP Program “E-Governance for Accountability and Community Participation” has been systematically supporting digitalization processes in the Volyn oblast since 2015. During this time, the Lutsk City Territorial Community, as a participant in the pilot project, has received consistent assistance from EGAP. Together with Lutsk, the following projects have been implemented:
Mobile Suitcase. Enables the provision of administrative services outside the physical office: for elderly people, people with reduced mobility, and residents of remote settlements (received in 2016, upgraded in 2025).
Equipment for reading ID-passports and Diia scanners. Significantly speeds up service delivery by automatically reading electronic documents and reduces the risk of errors from manual data entry (received in 2022).
Energy independence systems for (solar power plants and backup power systems). Ensure uninterrupted operation of the Department for at least 6 hours during power outages, reduce electricity consumption from the grid, and provide charging opportunities for civilians’ phones during blackouts (installed in 2023).
Electronic diaries and grade books in schools. Improve transparency and efficiency of interaction between teachers, students, and parents, and enhance learning quality. EGAP supported implementation in 5 schools.
SVOI Chatbot. A multifunctional tool for interaction with authorities: information about institutions and services, government performance evaluation, e-appeals, e-democracy tools, online queue registration, and community news (implemented since late 2021).
E-DEM e-democracy platform. Includes petitions, consultations, participatory budgeting, and the Open Community geoplatform. Since launch: 1,503 petitions registered; participatory budgeting votes held since 2018; 3,618 reports filed on the Open City platform; 110 public consultations conducted.
Official Web Portal. Official websites, including those built on the SVOI platform (implemented in 2022). Integrated with legislation and styled in the Diia design.
Self-service stations. Allow citizens to print, scan, and copy documents independently, saving applicants’ time and speeding up certain administrative services (installed August 2, 2023).
Biometric Stations. Allow citizens to save time and money by obtaining passports without traveling to another city. An additional workstation is being installed in the office located in the Civil Registry building (equipment received, communication channel set up, information security system under development).
Accessibility Audit. Involving professional architects to systematically address accessibility issues.
With EGAP support, Lutsk cooperates on training civil servants and local government employees.
In 2018, an Innovation Center was established (equipped with computers, training programs, and trainers in e-governance and e-democracy). Since 2020, joint training programs have been implemented: long-term courses in Digital Literacy, Information Security, and specialized training for administrators.
In 2020, Lutsk piloted the comprehensive eBaby service, with the very first birth certificate under the service issued in Lutsk.
Department of informational work,
Department of International Cooperation and Project Activities