Participants of the citizens’ assembly jointly developed and presented 20 recommendations to local authorities on the topic: “How can we make our community a place where young people want to stay and build their future?”

On 25–26 April 2026, the third and final session of the citizens’ assembly took place in Rivne. The assembly was organised by the Rivne City Council with comprehensive methodological and financial support from the Council of Europe project “Strengthening multilevel governance and local democracy to support Ukraine’s recovery”.

Over the course of three sessions (weekends), members of the citizens’ assembly, selected through a random and representative sortition process, worked in groups to develop recommendations for local authorities on how to make the community a place where young people want to stay and build their future.

While during the first session participants familiarised themselves with the topic and the local context, and during the second session engaged in more in-depth discussions, the third session focused on formulating, discussing, refining, and voting on concrete recommendations for the authorities.

An important element of the third weekend was the discussion of the draft recommendations with seven representatives of different structural units of the municipal authorities. This provided an opportunity to further refine the recommendations based on their feedback.

A total of 45 participants were randomly selected to reflect the community’s socio-demographic profile, including gender, age, education level, and place of residence. Most had no previous experience with civic participation tools and were taking part in such a process for the first time.

“I am truly impressed that citizens of different ages, professions, educational backgrounds, and social status can come together around an issue relevant to the community, develop practical recommendations for the authorities, and believe in their implementation,” said one of the participants.

“After the assembly, I have only positive impressions. It was a very valuable exchange of experience and ideas. In my opinion, many people gained more confidence in themselves, their knowledge, and their abilities. The process was organised at the highest level. Thank you,” added another participant.

The developed recommendations were presented to the Secretary of the City Council and Acting Mayor, Viktor Shakyrzian, who attended the closing session of the assembly.

The closing event was also addressed by Maciej Janczak, Head of the Council of Europe Office in Ukraine, who emphasised the value of the recommendations developed and the importance of their further implementation by local self-government authorities.

The results and a comprehensive report on the entire citizens’ assembly process will be presented in due course.

To mark the first citizens’ assembly in the Rivne community and the fruitful cooperation for the development of the community, Viktor Shakirzyan and Maciej Janczak planted a tree near the Rivne City Council building.

• More information about the citizens’ assembly in the Rivne community is available on the website of the Rivne City Council and under the link.

The preparation and implementation of the citizens’ assembly take place within the Council of Europe Action Plan for Ukraine “Resilience, Recovery and Reconstruction” for 2023-2026 and the project “Strengthening multilevel governance and local democracy to support Ukraine’s recovery”, implemented by the Council of Europe Centre of Expertise for Multilevel Governance at the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities.