They were waiting for funds from the state budget: Lychko explained why an emergency session had to be convened over the issue of meals in Mykolaiv’s nurseries

Hanna Lychko, Head of the Education Department at Mykolaiv City Council. Photo: NikVesti

The Education Department had expected 60 million to be allocated from the state budget for meals in Mykolaiv’s nurseries. Consequently, the issue was not raised at the previous city council session, but this week an extraordinary session had to be convened urgently as the funds for meals had run out.

This came to light during a meeting of the Mykolaiv City Council’s budget committee today, 9 July, according to NikVesti.

Councillor Andrii Yermolaiev asked how it was possible to approve Mykolaiv’s budget for 2026 without realising that there was not enough money in it to cover meals for children in nurseries and schools for the whole year. And in July, an extraordinary session had to be convened because the funds had suddenly run out. He also mentioned that the city council had exempted the company «Nibulon» from land tax.

«But how could this happen so suddenly? There’s an accounts department that monitors when funds are running low; there’d only just been a city council session – why didn’t they say in advance that funds needed to be reallocated? It’s as if they’d opened their wallet this morning and realised: «Oh, there’s no money left. We’ll call a session.» Was it really necessary to first exempt one private company from 18 million in tax, and then valiantly try to find 60 million?» said Andrii Yermolaiev.

Budget Committee meeting. Screenshot of the broadcast

According to Hanna Lychko, head of the education department, the funds remaining for school meals are being monitored.

«The Education Department began raising the issue verbally from the end of April. A letter regarding the shortage of funds in May was sent to Mr Oleksandr (Sienkevych, — note),» noted Hanna Lychko.

She mentioned that the city council had approached the Government regarding the funding shortfall and was awaiting a response.

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«We saw the full response to NikVesti, which stated that pre-school education institutions are funded exclusively by local authorities, which is why the responsibility for funding school meals lies with the local authorities. Furthermore, as recently as last week, we observed that funds for children’s meals had been allocated at national level. And when we actually saw the Cabinet of Ministers’ resolution, it referred exclusively to general secondary education institutions. So, in principle, we were still waiting; we had hoped that these funds would be provided from the state budget,» replied Hanna Lychko to the councillor.

As Mykolaiv did not receive any funds from the state budget, an extraordinary session had to be convened.

«If funds had been allocated to us, there would have been no need for it,» said the head of the education department.

She clarified that when Mykolaiv’s budget for 2026 was approved, a total requirement of 271.6 million hryvnias had been set aside for children’s meals — in nurseries, schools, special schools, and for those entitled to concessions in vocational education institutions. However, only 122.2 million hryvnias were actually allocated.

Budget shortfall

As a reminder, at the session of the Mykolaiv City Council on 28 May, it was reported that by the end of 2026, the city would be short of nearly 150 million hryvnias for children’s meals in educational institutions. Of this, over 109 million hryvnias is required for kindergartens, over 33 million hryvnias for co-funding school meals, and a further 7 million hryvnias for special schools and vocational education institutions.

At the time, city councillors appealed to the Cabinet of Ministers and the Verkhovna Rada, requesting that additional funding be allocated to Mykolaiv from the state budget.

In June, the Executive Committee of the Mykolaiv City Council reallocated 864,500 hryvnias for meals in nurseries. At the time, the city council noted that these funds would only last until the end of the summer, after which the city council would seek additional funding. There is currently a shortfall of 60 million hryvnias required to finalise the contract for meals in kindergartens.

At the end of June, the Ministry of Finance of Ukraine refused Mykolaiv’s request for 150 million hryvnias to organise meals in educational institutions. The ministry explained that these expenditure items for nurseries and vocational education institutions should be funded from the local authority budget, and also highlighted the growth in the city’s budget revenue.

On 1 July, the Government allocated a grant of 187.5 million hryvnias to fund school meals for pupils in the Mykolaiv region between September and November 2026.

At a staff meeting at the City Hall on 6 July, the head of the education department reported that funds for meals in nurseries would last until 8 July.

On 8 July, the executive committee approved amendments to the budget: it is proposed that 60 million hryvnias be allocated from the guarantee obligations that the city council provides when granting loans to municipal enterprises. This sum should be sufficient until the end of October.

Earlier, Mayor Oleksandr Sienkevych stated that Mykolaiv’s 2026 budget is a «survival budget» and does not cover all the community’s needs. According to him, the city lacks the funds to implement the state-initiated pay rise for teachers, pay for utilities, repair roads and cover other expenses.

Back at the start of the year, Mayor Oleksandr Sienkevych reported that the Ministry of Finance would analyse Mykolaiv’s financial situation to assess the city’s need for additional funding. At the same time, he emphasised that the final decision depends not only on the Ministry of Finance’s calculations, but also on the political will of parliament.