Dear readers and partners,

We are happy to introduce to you the second for the 2006 year edition of the biannual English Digest of the Foundation for Local Government Reform. The materials you will read in the Digest were selected among many articles published regularly in the monthly information newsletter of the Foundation "The Local Self-Government Reform" during the second half of 2006.

The FLGR's newsletter reaches all 264 Bulgarian municipalities, the 28 regional authorities, all regional and professional associations of municipalities, various ministries, the National Assembly, state institutions, universities and NGOs, working with local governments in Bulgaria.

The articles in this issue cover the results of the work of FLGR in different areas, assisting the Bulgarian municipalities to smoothly begin their work as true European municipalities at the beginning of 2007 and benefit from forthcoming European Union membership in favour of their communities.

We hope that the ideas, efforts and achievements we share on the pages of the Digest will show you the intensity of the municipal life in Bulgaria and the intensity of the work of FLGR in the second half of 2007.

FLGR is open for future international partnerships with organisations, institutions and local governments and willing to contribute to the local government capacity building in all various aspects!

Ginka Kapitanova,

Executive Director, FLGR