Housing Policy Planning (GE0079)

Commitment 14: Developing housing policy document and action plan

The homelessness problem handling, given its complexity, requires from the State the identification of both short-term and long-term priorities. Accordingly, the government aims at creating within the open government framework an interagency commission/council, which will analyze the current state, challenges, and develop a housing policy document and action plan.

Commitment 14: Developing housing strategy document for the realization of a right to housing
Lead Agency Ministry of Internally Displaced from the Occupied Territories, Labor, Health and Social Affairs of Georgia
Other Involved Actors Public Agency Ministry of Regional Development and Infrastructure; Ministry of Economy and Sustainable Development; municipalities; Parliament of Georgia.
Civil Society / Private Sector / International organization
Donor organizations
Issues to be Addressed To date, the country lacks a unified vision and strategy, which would serve as a basis for stage-by-stage handling of the problem locally. Legislative regulations, including a correct homeless status establishment methodology, are vague in the part of distribution of the rights and functions of the central and local governments. Accordingly, the conduct of unified, complex activities, which will be continuous in time and regularly ensures the elimination of defects, is necessary.
Main Objective The main objective of the housing document making is that the State would, through identifying the existing needs, develop a vision in the form of the housing policy document and action plan, which shall meet the homelessness challenges in Georgia on a stage-by-stage basis.

OGP Principles Transparency Accountability Civil Participation Technology and Innovation
 
Milestones to Fulfill the Commitment New or ongoing commitment Start date End date
Establishment of an interagency commission/council New January 2019 March 2019
Development of the housing policy document and action plan by engagement of different groups New July 2019 December 2020
Submission of the housing policy document and action plan for approval New May 2021 September 2021
Indicator The country has the housing policy document and action plan.
Risks and Assumptions The issue is complex and its successful implementation depends on the engagement of respective donor and civil society.

Commitment 14: Developing Housing Policy Document and Action Plan

Language of the commitment as it appears in the action plan:

“The homelessness problem handling, given its complexity, requires from the State the identification of both short-term and long-term priorities. Accordingly, the government aims at creating within the open government framework an interagency commission/council, which will analyze the current state, challenges, and develop a housing policy document and action plan

To date, the country lacks a unified vision and strategy, which would serve as a basis for stage-by-stage handling of the problem locally. Legislative regulations, including a correct homeless status establishment methodology, are vague in the part of the distribution of the rights and functions of the central and local governments. Accordingly, the conduct of unified, complex activities, which will be continuous in time and regularly ensures the elimination of defects, is necessary.”

Milestones: 

1. Establishment of an interagency commission/council
2. Development of the housing policy document and action plan by engagement of different groups.
3. Submission of the housing policy document and action plan for approval

Start Date: January 2019

End Date: September 2021

Editorial note: For the full text of this commitment, please see https://www.opengovpartnership.org/documents/georgia-action-plan-2018-2019/.

Context and Objectives

According to a 2016 report from a local nongovernmental organization, the Human Rights Education and Monitoring Center, [75] there is no state policy that would address the problem of homelessness in Georgia on a national level. The Open Society Georgia Foundation (OSGF) has been working on homelessness since 2016 and proposed including a commitment on this area in Georgia’s fourth OGP action plan. This commitment envisages developing an interagency council for homelessness, a state policy document on housing, and an action plan that will outline particular steps for reaching the goals of the policy. The United States Agency for International Development’s Good Governance Initiative (USAID GGI) will provide support to the interagency commission/council to analyse the current status and challenges and develop an evidence-based housing policy document (strategy and action plan). These documents will be developed in order to comply with the Government of Georgia (GoG) policy planning manual requirements and through conducting a regulatory impact assessment (RIA). This commitment is relevant to the OGP value of access to information. Also, the development of a housing policy strategy through engagement with “different groups” makes this commitment relevant to the OGP value of civic participation.

The main outputs of this commitment are verifiable, namely the interagency council, the housing policy document, and action plan. However, the composition of the council and the groups that will be engaged while developing the housing policy document are not specified. The potential impact of this commitment on the issue of homelessness is difficult to assess, because that effect will depend heavily on the contents of the policy document and action plan. Therefore, the potential impact is coded as minor. However, representatives from OSGF [76] and USAID GGI. [77] noted that the commitment could represent an important first step toward addressing the problem of homelessness in Georgia.

Next steps

Although this commitment addresses an important issue in the country (homelessness and the right to adequate housing), the IRM researcher recommends continuing this work outside of the framework of future OGP action plans. The IRM researcher further recommends focusing on establishing and promoting awareness of the rights of homeless people and the obligations of authorities on this issue.

[75] Human Rights Education and Monitoring Center, Homelessness: Analysis of State Policies, 2016, https://bit.ly/31Szvkb.

[76] Anano Tsintsabadze, Participatory Democracy Program Project Coordinator, Open Society Georgia Foundation, interview with IRM researcher, 15 May 2019.

[77] Mariam Gorgadze, Deputy Chief of Party and Mikheil Darchiashvili, Governance Manager at USAID Good Governance Initiative, interview with IRM research, 14 May 2019.

14. Develop housing document and action plan

Theme IV: Creating Safer Communities

Limited

In April 2019, an interagency council for homelessness was created under the Ministry of Internally Displaced Persons from the Occupied Territories, Labor, Health, and Social Affairs of Georgia. [56] The council is supported by USAID GGI and operates along with the working group that consists of state agencies, CSOs, and field experts. However, the council did not develop the housing policy. According to USAID GGI ^[57] and the government point of contact, [58] the housing policy was temporarily put on hold due to other priorities in the political agenda. Open Society Georgia Foundation, who initiated this commitment, also assessed the work of the council as “ineffective”. [59]