“There are priorities in the individual regional programs and in the municipality strategies for planned development, which are clearly not followed often during the application for the various EU financial instruments.”

These were the words of Veselin Zlatev, councilor of the prime minister on the issues related to regional development, when he was asked about the funding halt for several projects in different municipalities.

“Some municipalities are trying to realize projects that aren’t appropriate for the times of financial crisis, and the decision of the expert staff of various ministries is very justified. In this sense, the logical next steps for the municipalities will be to review their development plans and strategies.

They will no doubt realize that a large part of their projects are no longer fitting the social and economic environment, and while they were good propositions in 2004, their update for the current situation is inevitable.”

According to Veselin Zlatev, the efforts should be concentrated on the pressing everyday issues and the better servicing of the citizens. He emphasized that the priorities have to be determined for each region individually to avoid numerous applications for a single financial instrument with limited resources.