TCZEW – A CITY WITH COUNTY RIGHTS. A VARIANT ANALYSIS OF ADMINISTRATIVE CHANGES IN THE AREA OF TCZEWSKI AND STAROGARDZKI COUNTIES

Abstract

In 1999 the Polish government introduced an administrative reform and created cities with county rights. Not only the largest Polish cities, but also many middle-towns, were given these rights. This analysis includes possibilities and consequences of transforming Tczew into a city with county rights and creating “Kociewski” county by combining the rest of Tczewski county territory with starogardzki county. It has been proven that it is impossible to enforce this solution in current law conditions, therefore new regulations have to be introduced first. However, it already happened one time a few years ago in the case of Wałbrzych. There are a lot of arguments for transforming Tczew into a city with county rights which are: financial aspects and conflicts in the management of roads, local hospital and schools by dual town and county administration. Four different variants of transformation were studied, but only one which assumes creating “Kociewski” county and incorporation of surrounding villages to Tczew, seems to be beneficial for most of entities.