Chapter 1. Observing social rights In the course of consideration of the appeal of citizen Sh. from Ivano-Frankivsk oblast, it was found that the commission for rehabilitation at the Ivano-Frankivsk State Oblast Administration did not start functioning until July 2019 due to the long formation of its membership. At the end of 2019, the composition of the regional commission of Zhytomyr State Oblast Administration was not formed. In violation of the requirements of the Model Regulations on the Regional Commission on Rehabilitation approved by the Order of the Ministry of Culture #926, the announcement on the commencement of the work of the regional commission and its personal composition is not published on the official websites of Chernivtsi, Kyiv, Luhansk, Rivne, Sumy, Ternopil, Zaporizhia, and Zhytomyr SOAs. Certain SOAs do not publish information on the date, time, venue and agenda of their meetings on their websites no later than 10 days before the date of the meeting as requested. Citizens’ right to social protection in the context of decentralization During 2019, the Commissioner conducted 13 monitoring visits to 36 sites in different regions of Ukraine – local self-government bodies, amalgamated territorial communities (hereinafter referred to as ATCs), state administrations, departments of labour and social protection of the population, departments on social protection, territorial centres for social services focusing on the observance of human rights and freedoms of citizens in the field of social protection in the context of decentralization. During these monitoring visits, a number of systemic violations and deficiencies in the field of observance of citizens’ right to social protection were identified, in particular: • insufficient/lack of funding for local budget programmes for the provision of sanatorium treatment to certain categories of citizens; • insufficient/lack of funding to provide free travel to privileged categories of the population. There is also the problem that certain administrative and territorial units lack municipal and suburban transport routes, which makes it impossible to exercise the right of citizens to free travel in a certain territory. In particular, inter-regional buses that the citizens use because of the lack of suburban routes are not required to provide privileged ride; • failure to implement measures to prevent homelessness and identify the homeless people in full scope as required by the law; • failure to identify the needs of the population of the administrative-territorial unit in social services; • the internal and external evaluation of the quality of social services and control of their provision do not take place. The Commissioner’s proposals for the elimination of identified violations following the results of monitoring visits were not properly implemented, as the recipients of these proposals referred to the limited financial resources of the communities. 29 CHAPTER 1 Example