Implementation of Integrated Territorial Investments in Poland – Rationale, Results, and Recommendations

The EU Cohesion Policy 2014–2020 is aimed at the support of endogenous potential of a given region and countries perceived in terms of functionality instead of existence of administrative borders, both in the aspect of territorialisation of intervention and support of rules of territorial governance (Camagni, Capello 2015; Binek et al. 2016; Kaczmarek, Kociuba 2017). The approach is strongly reflected in the Europe 2020 Strategy (2010) which requires policy makers to consider how different aspects of smart, sustainable, and inclusive growth are interrelated. As a result of the implementation of this strategy, the EU Cohesion Policy 2014–2020 goals are aimed at reinforcing policy performance, and focus on results and maximising the impact of EU funding through thematic concentration promoting a strategic and integrated approach in general, and to deliver a more targeted support of the Structural Funds in practice.

The tool implementing the objective in the current programming period is Integrated Territorial Investments. It is an instrument which continues and develops the activities of the communities within the integrated approach conducted in the 1970s and 1980s (e.g. Integrated Development Operations and Integrated Mediterranean Programmes) (Pietrzyk 2004). In the current perspective, ITIs are a tool introducing the urban dimension to the Cohesion Policy (EC 2014) and constitutes a legal response of the European Commission to the necessity to strengthen the integrated approach to development programming combining policies, sectors, and funds recently postulated by member countries. ITIs are treated as the driving force of integration of activities for sustainable development of cities and their functional areas (FUAs). Moreover, the objective of ITIs is: –

an increase in the effect of FUAs on the shape and way of performance of activities supported in their area in the scope of the Cohesion Policy;

In a broader context, ITIs aim at the introduction of thematic concentration in selected geographic areas, i.e. the concentration of regional policy interventions on strategic areas/potentials determining the competitiveness of regions/territories in a longer term. This occurs through limiting interventions to particular categories of intersectoral activities/projects, responding comprehensively to the needs and problems of cities and their functional areas in the scope of selected strategic areas (CEC 2014).

The legal basis for the ITI introduction at the EU level is determined by 3 regulations of the European Parliament and the EU Council of 17 December 2013, i.e. the General Regulation No. 1303/2013 (Article 36), the Regulation of European Regional Development Fund No. 1301/2013 (Article 7), and the Regulation of European Social Fund No. 1304/2013 (Article 12). The ITI is expected to support integrated actions at different territorial scales (cities, FUAs, regions, cross-border areas). ITIs can be financed within thematic objectives (TO) 1–10 for the European Structural and Investment Funds (ESIF) and have favourable rules of financing, including the combination of funding from the ERDF, ESF and Cohesion Fund (complemented with financial support from the EAFRD or the EMFF) under more than one priority axis (PA) of one or more operational programmes (OP). Thus, a relevant operational programme or programmes will describe the approach to the use of the ITI and the indicative financial allocation from each priority axis (Article 36 of the General Regulation). Pursuant to the requirement of the European Commission, member states are obliged to allocate a minimum of 5% of the pool of resources from the ERDF to ITI implementation. Each country has to specify the rules of selection of areas for the implementation of integrated actions, and estimated an indicative allocation for those actions at the national level in its Partnership Agreement (PA) (Article 7 of the ERDF regulation).

The ex-ante condition of obtaining financing is particularly the establishment of an ITI union and the development of an ITI strategy. ITI unions develop institutionalised partnerships of ITI implementing entities. Pursuant to Article 7(4) of the ERDF Regulation, the ITI union shall be responsible for tasks relating, at least, to the selection of operations for the implementation. This permits “/…/ the managing authorities to delegate the implementation of parts of different priority axes to one body (a local authority) to ensure that investments are undertaken in a complementary manner” (CEC 2012, 9). It means that the member state or the managing authorities (MA) of an OP may designate one or more intermediate bodies (IBs) (local authorities, regional development bodies, NGOs) to carry out the management and implementation of an ITI (Article 36 of the General Regulation). The ITI strategy is an intersectoral territorial strategy mentioned in Article 7 of the ERDF regulation and Article 12 of the ESF regulation. Pursuant to Article 7 of the regulation of the ERDF, the strategy specifies integrated activities for the purpose of liquidation of demographic, social, environmental, and climatic problems occurring in urban areas. It should be based on development needs and result from territorial and demographic analyses. It has to be coherent with the development objectives of the country and region. ITI strategies aim at linking the thematic objectives specified in the Partnership Agreement (PA) or other territorial arrangements and provisions of regional/national operational programmes with the territorial dimension.

The territorial approach to the intraregional policy, i.e. addressing intervention packages to particular types of territories, and diversifying activities depending on the features of particular areas has become one of the tasks of regional policy, and the selection of areas aimed at concentrating interventions has become one of the challenges of EU countries. In practice, ITIs are implemented in 20 EU countries (12 use ITIs outside Article 7), whereas the mechanism of implementation in each of the countries is characterised by a variability of features, as well as a diverse thematic, geographic, financing and organisational approach (Biniek et al. 2016; van der Zwet, Bachtler 2018). The ITI instrument supports functional urban areas in countries such as Poland, the Czech Republic, or Slovakia. In Great Britain, Belgium, or Germany, it is only applied in selected regions (Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly; provinces Limburg, Kempen, West Flanders; Baden-Wurtemberg, Schleswig-Holstein). In Finland ITIs support the development of Helsinki, Espoo, Vantaa, Oulu, Tampere, Turku which implemented the ‘Six City Strategy’ (6Aika).

According to the financial data, the total allocated funding to ITIs is €13.8 billion, most of which (€11.8 billion) is funded through the ERDF, with 12% (€1.7 billion) funded through the ESF and 0.3 billion from Cohesion Fund. Nine member states decided to use resources combined from the ERDF and ESF in ITI implementation. Almost 80% of this ITI funding is concentrated in nine member states. The greatest financing of ITIs was obtained by Poland (€3.8 billion).

Fifteen member states use the allocation of ITIs under the ERDF either entirely (e.g. Greece, Finland, Croatia, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxemburg, Netherlands, Poland, Slovenia, Slovakia, United Kingdom) or partly (Czech Republic, France, Italy, Sweden), which represents around half of the total allocated budget (€7.1 billion) (van der Zwet, Bachtler 2018).

An ITI is aimed at the territorialisation of interventions and strengthening cooperation between LGUs in the implementation of the Cohesion Policy. Due to this, it is of key importance to designate areas of intervention and establish inter-municipal cooperation. The decision on the involvement of Poland in ITI implementation was taken in 2012. The Ministry of Regional Development (institution responsible for the implemented tool) passed a decision that ITIs will be implemented obligatorily in FUAs of voivodeship capitals (FUAs of VCs), and complementarily in FUAs of regional and subregional centres – depending on separate decisions of voivodeship authorities (Principles of accommodating…, January 2013). In the scope of preparatory works, several necessary activities were performed, resulting in: firstly, the delimitation of FUAs of voivodeship centres (Delimitation criteria…, February 2013) as a precondition for the establishment of LGU partnership, and development of the ITI strategy; secondly, preparation of ministry detailed guidelines describing the rules of ITI implementation in Poland (Principles for the implementation… July 2013); and thirdly, under-taking efforts for the purpose of preparation of a Partnership Agreement (PA) including the rules of ITI implementation and the act that would determine standards and regulate procedures of implementation of the Cohesion Policy, including ITI tools (they both came into force in 2014). The provisions of the Partnership Agreement (2014) were transferred to the system of national legislature in the so-called implementation act

Act of 11 July 2014 on the principles of implementation of the cohesion policy programmes, financed under the 2014–2020 financial perspective (Journal of Laws 2014, item 1146 as amended).

Table 1 presents the basic characteristics of the implementation of ITIs in the Polish Cohesion Policy in the 2014–2020 programming period.

In practice, ITIs are implemented in 26 FUAs in Poland. These include 17 FUAs of voivodeship centres (due to the contiguity of the functional areas of Bydgoszcz and Toruń, a common ITI was established) and 9 implemented in the FUAs of regional centres (FUAs of RCs) or sub-regional centres (FUAs of SCs). Financing of ITIs occurs through projects implemented in the scope of 16 ROPs and national operational programmes: Infrastructure and Environment 2014–2020, Eastern Poland 2014–2020 (5 voivodeships of Eastern Poland: Lubelskie, Podkarpackie, Podlaskie, Świętokrzyskie, and Warmińsko-Mazurskie), to a low degree in the scope of the Operational Programme Technical Assistance 2014–2020. ITIs are implemented through designated measures or submeasures in the scope of at least two priority axes of the regional operational programme financed from two structural funds (Article 30, point 3 of the Implementation Act). In the case of Poland, they are the ERDF and ESF. Projects implemented in the scope of an ITI focus around eight directions of intervention, and combine eight thematic objectives. The highest number of directions is combined in TO8 (Table 2) (PA 2014).

Pursuant to the provisions of Principles of accommodating… (2013: 11), at least 5% of structural funds (EFRR, EFS) from the so-called programming reserve were aimed to be allocated for the implementation of ITIs in FUAs of voivodeship centres, and the division of resources between 16 ROPs was to be based on an algorithm particularly considering criteria specifying the number of residents of the functional urban area. Pursuant to the detailed provisions of the Partnership Agreement (2014), a total of €2.4 billion was obligatorily reserved for the basic allocation of voivodeship ITIs in 16 ROPs

At the level of all ROPs, the total allocation for the implementation of ITIs in FUAs of VCs in comparison to the total allocation of particular funds for Poland is at least 5.2% of allocation of the ERDF and 2.4% of allocation of the ESF (PA 2014: 228).

Fig. 1

Conditions of ITI implementation include: 1) the establishment of an ITI union; 2) the preparation of an ITI strategy and a positive opinion on it given by: a) the managing authority of a regional operational programme (MA ROP) within the possibilities of ITI financing under this programme, b) the minister in charge of regional development in accordance with the partnership agreement and the possibilities of financing projects from national operational programmes, if stipulated by the ITI strategy; 3) concluding an arrangement or agreement concerning ITI implementation between an ITI union and the relevant governing institution of ROP, particularly including the scope of entrusted tasks, covering at least the participation of the ITI union in the selection of projects for financing by the relevant governing institution of ROP and cooperation with MA in the preparation of criteria of selection of projects for designated measures or submeasures for ITI implementation (Article 30, point 5 of the Implementation Act). The implemented projects are selected in 2 modes: a) open call for proposals – the projects are chosen by the ITI union based on the rules arranged with MA ROP and included in the ITI strategy; b) restricted call for proposals – it is obligatory to enter projects in the ITI strategy in the form of a list of strategic projects. Moreover, in order to emphasise the complementary character of the project, its relations with other projects should be presented.

The ITI union can take form of an arrangement of self-governments, an association, or intercommune union (Principles for the implementation… 2013; PA 2014). The ITI strategy specifies in particular: 1) the diagnosis of the area of implementation of an ITI together with the analysis of developmental problems; 2) objectives to be implemented in the scope of an ITI, expected results and result and product indicators related to the implementation of the regional operational programme; 3) proposals of project selection criteria in the course of an open call for proposals; 4) a preliminary list of projects selected in the restricted call for proposals together with information on the way of their designation and linking to other projects, including those selected in the restricted call for proposals subject to positive opinions by the governing institution of the national operational programme; 5) sources of its financing; 6) conditions and procedures binding in the implementation of the ITI strategy (Article 30, point 8 of the Implementation Act). The legal basis of the ITI strategy is provided by the decision of the management board of an ITI union. The strategy and its amendments are prepared in cooperation with the relevant MA ROP and passed by the ITI union in the form of a resolution. The ITI strategy designates areas included in the composition of FUAs in which support is to be implemented (Principles for the implementation… 2013). Therefore, the most important issue at the first stage of ITI implementation was the delimitation of the support area, i.e. the determination of FUA boundaries.

Considering that functional urban areas appeared in planning-strategic documents in 2011 (National Spatial Development Concept 2011) and no guidelines were provided as to how to perform their delimitation, the Ministry of Regional Development commissioned the preparation of a document that would specify the areas of implementation of voivodeship ITIs. The document published in February 2013 entitled Delimitation criteria of functional urban areas of voivodeship centres, based on 7 statistical indices, specified ITI support areas for 18 voivodeship capitals (VC) (in the case of FUA of Bydgoszcz and Toruń – the capitals of Kujawsko-Pomorskie located relatively near each other, a single support area was designated) (Śleszyński 2013). Practice showed (Fig. 2) that ministerial delimitation was adopted in only 4 FUAs of voivodeship capitals (Wrocław, Zielona Góra, Gorzów Wielkopolski, Olsztyn). The remaining ones increased or reduced the ITI support area. This resulted, on the one hand, from earlier cooperation (Poznań, Szczecin, Tricity), arrangements of strategic documents at the regional level (Katowice, Łódź), arrangements of expert documents (Bydgoszcz–Toruń, Kielce), decisions of ITI unions (Warszawa, Kraków, Opole), or compromise between what the ministry proposed and what communes eventually declared cooperation in ITI implementation (remaining ones). They correspond with variants of delimitation in the following order: ministry, cooperation, strategic-planning, expert, and interim) (Kociuba 2017a).

Fig. 2

The implementation of regional and subregional ITIs was undertaken by the authorities of 5 voivodeships:

Dolnośląskie, where two near-border FUAs were designated, namely for Wałbrzych and Jelenia Góra,

Eventually, ITIs are implemented in 21.3% of communes in Poland, occupying a total of 17.5% of the area, and inhabited by 47.6% of the population of the country (Table 3).

Tracing the cooperation of LGUs in some cases resulting in the establishment of ITI unions shows certain patterns. The first forms of cooperation of LGUs in metropolitan areas of cities were recorded in the years 2000–2002 and 2005–2008, and particularly represented informal forms of cooperation, i.e. councils, partnership arrangements, development agencies, and more seldom took forms of institutionalised cooperation, i.e. as an association. The next period 2010–2011 brought the registration of municipal unions (Gorzów Wielkopolski, West Subregion) and associations led by Bydgoszcz, Poznań, Szczecin, Częstochowa, and neighbouring cities of Gdańsk and Gdynia. Cases of long-lasting cooperation of neighbouring communes also occurred with the exclusion of a central city (Warszawa, Rzeszów). A large majority of cooperation was established in the years 2013–2014. This was directly related to the possibility of use of investment financing under the ITI instrument (Table 4).

It should be emphasised that only few previously formalised partnerships got involved in ITI implementation adopting the role of the ITI union. This happened in the case of the FUAs of Poznań, Szczecin, Tricity, and the West Subregion. The role of the ITI union was not taken over by institutions with the longest history of inter-self-government cooperation, i.e. the Club of Heads of Communes, Mayors, and City Presidents of Częstochowskie Voivodeship established in 1992, or the Special-Purpose Association of Communes MG6 functioning in the FUA of Gorzów Wielkopolski since 1999. An interesting example is the Tricity FUA, where an arrangement was first concluded, and then the role of the ITI union was overtaken by the newly established Association Gdańsk–Gdynia–Sopot Metropolitan Area, stemming from the compromise between the activity of competing associations, the Association of Self-Governments of the Gdańsk Metropolitan Area (with Gdańsk as the leader), and the (Metropolitan) Forum of Heads of Communes, Mayors, City Presidents, and Starostas ‘NORDA’ (with Gdynia as a leader). Although the majority of partnerships were established only for the purpose of ITI implementation

They belong to ITI unions functioning in the functional areas of Białystok, Kielce, Lublin, Łódź, Central Subregion, Opole, Rzeszów, Warszawa, and all unions functioning in the FUA of RC/SC (except for the FUA of the West Subregion).

In the implementation of the rules of territorial governance – one of the objectives of ITI implementation – a very important issue is the degree of formalisation of partnerships that can influence the quality and rate of strategic programming of development and governance of FUAs (Kociuba 2017). In the functioning of an ITI union, the cooperation of cities/communes in programming the development and governance of FUAs (above the administrative boundaries of a particular LGU) seems to be the most important. In practice, the cooperation took a more or less institutionalised form (Table 3). In 9 out of 17 FUAs of VCs (those of Białystok, Tricity, Central Subregion, Kraków, Łódź, Opole, Poznań, Rzeszów, and Szczecin) and 1 FUA RC (Kalisz–Ostrów Agglomeration Association), ITIs are implemented by associations fulfilling the function of ITI unions (Table 3). Such ITI unions have more formalised structures, including councils/general meetings with a decision making function, composed of representatives of all communes included in the association, management boards composed of several persons (selected representatives of LGUs from the functional area) – executory bodies and revision commissions – control bodies. ITI offices fulfil auxiliary functions. They provide administrative support. They can also prepare drafts of strategies. The intermediate body (IB ITI) in ITI implementation in the scope of ROPs is the management board of the association. The only so far communal association, namely the Union of Communes and Poviats of the West Subregion of Śląskie Voivodeship, functions based on similar rules. In this case, the governance of the FUA is formalised and subject to full control.

The remaining 8 partnerships in FUA VC and 7 in RC FUAs and SC FUAs chose a less institutionalised form of cooperation, namely signing an arrangement on cooperation between the LGU for the purpose of common implementation of the ITI instrument (Table 3). In such a situation, the ITI union entrusts one of the units of territorial self-government, usually a voivodeship city, with tasks of the remaining entities, and is represented by the leader, usually the city president. The leader has the highest competences and the widest scope of the delegation of tasks. The role of the management board of the union is fulfilled by the council of the ITI union that can also be composed of socio-economic partners. Steering committees play an opinion-forming role, e.g. in the scope of acceptance of ITI strategies, and administrative functions are fulfilled by ITI offices usually within the structure of municipal offices. The remaining LGUs usually have their representatives in the council and steering committees. Adopting of the model by the majority of ITI unions proves the weakness of the culture of LGU cooperation. Unions in this legal form were established primarily for the purpose of consuming funds from ITI allocation, and their members had no earlier experience in intercommune cooperation (more in Kociuba 2017, 2017a; Kaczmarek, Kociuba 2017). Therefore, the safest solution for communes from the functional area proved to be transfer of the responsibility for the entire works involved in ITI implementation to the leader, which as a consequence further improves the strong position of the central city in a FUA.

As already emphasised an ITI union (including local/municipal authorities) must fulfill the role of intermediate body (IB) and implement tasks related at least to the selection of projects for subsidies. In practice, the authorities of the ITI union submit to the MA of the ROP lists of projects selected for support, prioritised based on criteria approved by the monitoring committee of a ROP, concerning the degree in accordance with the objectives of the ITI strategy. The MA of ROP performs the final verification of the qualified character of projects for subsidies (unless the arrangement between the ITI union and MA of ROP stipulates otherwise). The organisation of recruitment and complete assessment of projects in formal and substantive terms can be performed by local authorities, including municipal or MA of ROP. The greater scope of delegated tasks, the greater the effect of the ITI union on the performance of activities and works related to the entire recruitment process, selection of contractors, allocation costs, and monitoring of projects.

In practice, the scope of competences of the ITI union as IB took three forms (Kociuba 2017) beginning with: 1) the identification of strategic projects (two ITI unions currently function in this form – Szczecin and Białystok), through 2) conducting recruitment, selection of projects in the ITI union/assessment of projects (22 ITI unions), 3) the performance of a complete procedure of an open call for proposals for the MA (Opole and Wałbrzych) (Table 3). From the perspective of building governance competences, taking full responsibility, also in the financial dimension, for ITI implementation seems to be of key importance. It is disturbing that experience in the scope is gained by only two ITI unions.

The analysis of works on the development of the ITI strategies undertaken by ITI unions shows certain patterns. They are related to the delay of works on the implementation of the instrument, and particularly with delayed determination of the demarcation line between funds and activities financed in the scope of ROPs and NOPs. This led to a situation in which the strategies had to be edited among others by removing projects the financial feasibility of which was shifted to the national level. This caused delays in the approval of strategies in relation to the term of acceptance of ROP

The majority of ROPs were approved by the European Commission at the turn of 2104 and 2015.

Poland is a beneficiary of the greatest amount of resources in the scope of ITIs. ITI implementation occurs owing to combining resources from two funds: the ERDF and ESF, whereas in the case of Poland they are particularly funds dedicated to ITIs pursuant to Article 7 of the general regulation, in the scope of the ERDF (€3.2 million), and to a much lower degree from the ESF (only €0.5 million). No financing in the scope of Cohesion Funds was stipulated. Approximately €6.2 billion is allocated for the implementation of integrated measures in Poland. In that pool, €3.8 billion are resources from 16 ROPs constituting the basic source of financing of ITIs.

Moreover, the projects are supported by own resources and from three national operational programmes: Infrastructure and Environment (OP IE), Eastern Poland (OP EP) (5 voivodeships: Lubelskie, Podkarpackie, Podlaskie, Świętokrzyskie, and Warmińsko-Mazurskie), to a low degree (€20 million) in the scope of OP Technical Assistance (OP TA) (Fig. 3). Under 16 regional operational programmes (ROPs), the amounts allocated for ITIs in the scope of the ERDF is higher than the threshold determined by EC (5%), and constitutes 8%. Own resources are an additional support.

Fig. 3

Support obtained by particular FUAs for ITI implementation differs from the provisions of Partnership Agreement (2014) (Fig. 2). In practice, allocation for FUAs of voivodeship centres in 16 ROPs reaches almost €3 billion, whereas the lowest support among voivodeship ITIs was obtained by weakly populated FUAs of VCs in Lubuskie Voivodeship: Gorzów Wlkp., Zielona Góra (at a level of €50–58 million), and the highest, except for the Central Subregion comprising 71 communes inhabited by a total of 2.7 million residents (more than €760 million), Gdańsk–Gdynia–Sopot (Tricity) (€247 million), and Kraków (€236 million), also Wrocław (€264 million) and Łódź (more than €225 million). For the FUAs of Lublin, Białystok, and Warszawa, allocation changed only inconsiderably in comparison to the assumptions of the Partnership Agreement. ITIs in FUAs of regional and subregional centres are financed in the scope of the basic allocation in 5 ROPs to the total amount of €760 million. Attention should be paid to the high financing of ITIs in the FUAs of Wałbrzych and Jelenia Góra, and subregions in Śląskie Voivodeship, with amounts approximate to the allocation for ITIs for Lublin and Szczecin, and in the case of Wałbrzych exceeding allocation for ITIs in the Warszawa FUA (in the group of transition regions). The remaining ITI unions negotiated relatively low amounts in this aspect, particularly those in Warmińsko-Mazurskie Voivodeship (the FUAs of Olsztyn, Elbląg and Ełk, €97 million in total) (Fig. 4).

Fig. 4

Fig. 5

Until the end of May 2018, more than 1500 projects were contracted under 16 ROPs to a total amount of more than €1.7 billion. The analysis of contracting of ITIs shows high advancement of works in the Gdańsk–Gdynia–Sopot FUA (where the implementation of more than 80% of projects has been contracted), as well as Zielona Góra, Kraków, Gorzów Wielkopolski, and Białystok (more than 70%). Activities related to the implementation of projects in the scope of ITIs in the FUA of Wrocław are very slow – only 3.5% of the allocation has been used, and in regional and subregional FUAs (approximately 10% on average, and in Elbląg no project has been contracted yet) (Fig. 4). It is noticeable that the difficulties in contracting occur especially where the diversity and dispersion of undertaken measures is the greatest (Dolnośląskie and Śląskie Voivodeship), and the lowest – in subregional centres which not only obtained the lowest financial support for the implementation of ITIs, but also have no experience in earlier cooperation of LGUs (Kociuba, Szafranek 2018).

ITI unions had a choice of eight directions of intervention, combining eight thematic objectives. In practice, they decided to use to the greatest extent: financing in the scope of TO4 supporting the shift towards a low-carbon economy in all sectors (all 26 ITI strategies stipulate financing in the scope of this TO), TO9 promoting social inclusion, combating poverty and any discrimination, and TO10 aimed at investing in education, training, and vocational training for skills and lifelong learning (21 ITI unions each). Although PA does not stipulate the implementation of undertakings under the implementation of TO2 and TO5, part of the ITI unions decided to take this step and negotiated their financing under ROPs (Fig. 6).

The most popular measures are directed at the development of public transport and construction of cycling paths (implemented by all ITI unions under investment priority 4e), the development of educational programmes for pupils (under IP 10i), implemented in 20 FUAs, and financing of thermomodernisation of public purpose buildings (IP 4c). Financing of activities directed at the development of R&D infrastructure and an increase in innovations in enterprises, as well as improvement in the accessibility of social services was only undertaken by single ITI unions (Fig. 7).

ITIs are assumed to support territorialisation of investments in functional urban areas, and directions of interventions, like the entire Cohesion Policy implementing the provisions of the Europe 2020 Strategy, should strengthen the competitive position of FUAs in three dimensions: smart, sustainable, and inclusive.

The presented review shows that the lowest popularity among ITI unions shaping sustainable development of FUAs concerned activities supporting building “smart” economy and society (in the scope of TO1, TO2, and TO3), whereas the need to support enterprises and the development of R&D infrastructure was recognised to the lowest degree. This was related to a change in the demarcation line in the implementation of TO1. Resources are the most frequently allocated for connecting utilities to the building land (17 FUAs), providing possibilities of attracting investors. Only 8 ITI unions took the decision on financing the implementation of e-services in public administration. This does not result from the fact that the condition of Polish administration in this scope is sufficiently good and does not require new investments (Gonciarski, Mazurek 2014; Śledziewska, Zięba 2016), but from the priority character of other measures.

In the context of implementation of the ‘sustainable’ component, the priority was the development of public transport together with the purchase of new low-emission fleet, or the expansion of cycling paths (all the analysed FUAs, but only 3 will invest in the modernisation and construction of public transport infrastructure) and construction and modernisation of roads (16 FUAs). Activities related to thermomodernisation also have been enjoying popularity for many years (19 FUAs). In this context, it is disturbing that activities related to support using renewable energy sources will be conducted only in 5 FUAs. It is also disturbing that, in the conditions of the vast disproportion in the provision of water supply and the sewage network, ITI unions mostly supported the expansion of the water supply network (11 FUAs), and to a much lower extent (only 4 FUAs) the expansion of the sewage network that is evidently lacking, especially in suburban communes under strong urbanisation pressure (Kociuba, Matacz 2018).

In the aspect of strengthening the ‘inclusive’ component, ITI unions prioritise the development of educational programmes for pupils and students, particularly in technical and IT courses (20 FUAs), training for pupils/students and the improvement of teachers’ competences in vocational schools (16 FUAs). This is in strong relation to the crisis of vocational and technical education in Poland (System szkolnictwa … 2016; Chłoń-Domińczak et al. 2016; EC 2016). It is characteristic that new equipment and facilities in such schools, usually obsolete

Schools in Poland are financed from the budget of communes and cities, hardly sufficient for payment of salaries for teachers. The majority of schools experience a chronic deficit of resources. Due to this, a multimedia projector, laptop, interactive board or good equipped laboratory are luxury in Polish schools. Results of the audit by the Supreme Audit Office show that 40% of district self-governments had difficulties with providing appropriate conditions and infrastructure for vocational education (System szkolnictwa..., 2016).