Jacek Werder, a member of the Citizens Network Watchdog Poland, is interviewed by Paula Kłucińska.

Paula Kłucińska: How did you get started as a watchdog?

Jacek Werder: I was interested in local politics on a casual basis for about a dozen years, but never consistently or systematically. That changed a bit after I moved from Warsaw to one of the municipalities near it. Initially, I reviewed the information available on the Public Information Bulletin and the municipality’s website. I started following the council sessions, thanks to a resident who attended them and shared the videos on YouTube. Back then, it was not yet mandatory to record the sessions. 

Somewhere around 2017, in connection with the upcoming local elections, I thought our municipality could use a change. People whined under their breath, but it didn’t take the form of any tangible action. I had absolutely no ambition to run for election, but that’s when I sent out my first public information request, concerning a bike path project, which was prepared and then ended up in a drawer. There was a problem with receiving the information, the mayor of the municipality’s responses were evasive. That got me curious.

During the election period I was involved not so much in supporting election committees as in criticising the authorities, i.e. pointing out unsettled matters, on the basis of documents I managed to obtain through access to public information. I even had a small success, because when I noticed that contrary to the project, the drainage of a public road near my house was not done, I asked about it and it turned out the contractor had done 150 meters more of the road than the contract stipulated, without any annex. The question prompted action and showed that someone was watching.

The next stage was the change of power, which turned out to be rather illusory. The promises of those who came to power, above all in the area of transparency, social consultation, inclusion of the society in decision-making, turned out to be “smoke and mirrors”. It motivated me and I started to ask the new authorities questions in a systematic way. I got back to the bike path topic and started asking about contracts. So passed the end of 2018 and the beginning of 2019.

In mid-2019, a neighbour said she heard an announcement on the radio about a recruitment drive for the Watchdog School. I was very hesitant at first, but I applied and was qualified. The School has bolstered my knowledge as well as allowed me to meet many like-minded people.

In your municipality, do you operate alone or with others involved? Do you have support?

Sometimes there are positive messages, but usually in one-on-one conversations. I run a website called „Leszno mazowieckie – niezależny informator Gminy Leszno” (“Leszno Mazowieckie – an independent Leszno municipality guide”) and people are sometimes afraid to “like” a post, lest it be misunderstood by the authorities. We still hold on to the belief that we should bow to authority and not ask uncomfortable questions.

My impression is that watchdog activities don’t tend to be met with enthusiasm. People seem to consider actions not directed at taking power an abstraction. If someone criticises the authorities, brings out various irregularities, they are treated as a potential competitor who will definitely run in future elections. If there are already some voices of support, they are directed in this political direction.

On a positive note, there are several people I work with on various issues. Lately it’s been the topic of sewage treatment plants. But I see that most people are not interested in what is happening in the municipality.

People usually fear the consequences of asking uncomfortable questions, but is there anything to fear? Do you feel fear yourself?

I am not affiliated with any municipal institution myself, but in small municipalities like mine the circle of people connected with the authorities is wide, whether through positions or contacts. The authorities very quickly start to pressure people not to criticise them. So much so that a village leader who liked my post got a reprimand from the councillor.

I understand people’s fears, but it seems to me that they often overestimate the authorities’ power to make someone’s lives difficult. If someone boldly says: “You can’t fire me just because I criticise you”, then those in power will back off. It’s just that people prefer to play it safe and keep their heads down, so it is difficult to convince others that they don’t need to be afraid. The people I work with, on the other hand, have nothing to do with the local job market.

People also firmly believe in high discretionary decision making and lack knowledge, so they claim it is better to live in harmony with authority. When I spoke to a friend who had withdrawn from social activities, he presented me with an argument that when he applied to build a house, the mayor would not agree. I tried to explain that the mayor has to follow the law, and if he breaks procedures, you can file a complaint. Nevertheless, my friend decided that it was better “not to mess with the authorities”. Like I said, the authorities are afraid of someone competent who knows their rights and does not get things done faster out of sympathy. There is still this feeling in the society and I don’t know how to change it.

So I am not afraid, but a large part of the community treats me like a Don Quixote.

You mentioned that you have followed the municipality council sessions from the beginning. How is the availability of the recordings and the admission itself to the meetings now?

I can’t complain because the municipality provides transmissions of both council sessions and all committees. As for the admission to the sessions, all was well until COVID-19, when Article 15zzx (remote sitting) came into use. In my opinion, the article is over-interpreted because there are no invitations to meetings that include public participation. You can watch on-line, but not on-site, which is also the case for the complaints, requests and petitions committee. Asking questions is excluded in the sense that there is no option to actively participate in the session and committee conducted on-line, you can only passively observe.

You also talked about requests for information. Do you ask your municipality authorities only? About what about, usually?

The right to information is a wonderful tool. The man in the street is no longer treated like a supplicant, because the office has to answer them. At first, the municipality was the main focus, but I realised that I was interested in more than just municipal topics.

At the end of 2019, I tried to explore in a systemic way how the “Clean Air” program worked [It is a government subsidy program for the replacement of old heaters and insulation of single-family houses – translator’s note]. There was a whole bunch of media reports that this program worked extremely poorly, because the application procedure was long and the applications were few. I asked all Voivodeship Funds for Environmental Protection and Water Management to provide information on how many applications were received, how many were successful and how many were not, for what amount, and what is the minimum, average and maximum waiting time for examining an application. This is where I hit a wall called “processed information”. A few Funds approached the subject rationally and drew information from their application databases, but most called on me to demonstrate a particularly important public interest. It taught me to be more systematic, but I also saw what the barriers were. I prepared a report that I sent out to various environmental portals. This gave me a small satisfaction, because relatively shortly after my monitoring, I heard that the Ministry of Climate and Environment was working on optimising the programme. It is still far from perfect, but procedures have been simplified and the time for handling applications has shortened. Of course, I’m not suggesting that it was my monitoring that did anything. I simply addressed an important topic, and my conclusions were similar to those of the Ministry.

The subject that intrigues me most and that I am researching not only in my municipality, although at the moment I am concentrating on the Western Warsaw poviat and the city of Warsaw, is the subject of garbage. I know that there is a monopoly of sorts in municipal waste management, that is, the market is divided between several companies that clearly do not get in each other’s way and, as a result, prices rise. So I started asking about prices, management of different waste fractions and various statistics. I use this data not only to analyse the effectiveness of waste management in municipalities, but also to educate people about the scale of the garbage problem we have.

What about the sewage treatment plants?

Our municipality is a typical municipality near a big city, where relatively many people from Warsaw come and build houses. The infrastructure has not kept up with the residential development. While the water supply is not bad, sewerage is non-existent in most of the municipality. We also don’t have a treatment plant, and our sewage flows to a neighbouring municipality.

However, in 2019 our municipality declared it would build its own treatment plant. Already the planning showed that the mayor is trying to hide some information. The first decision made was to commission a sewer concept. The contract for the concept was not published and it wasn’t until almost a year and several requests later that it came to light that the contractor had not done the work and the case went to court. Another concept was commissioned, this time for the treatment plant itself. It was decided to build the treatment plant of the current sewage facility, on a tiny plot of land that is close to some houses. This concept was not published as well, and the mayor started the procedure of issuing a decision on environmental conditions. If I hadn’t requested public information, residents wouldn’t even know about it.

The second issue is the development of the sewage network. What I monitor in my municipality, what I have also noticed in other municipalities and what a few years ago the Supreme Audit Office recognised as a nationwide problem, is that a lot of untreated sewage ends up in the environment. I ask about the septic tanks records, about how often they are inspected, about the plans for expansion of the sewage system. When sending out various requests, I noticed that municipalities are neglecting the monitoring of sewage management in places with no sewage system. If there is no sewage system, there are septic tanks. And people – to save money, because the cost of septic tank service is higher than the cost of sewer collection – have these septic tanks leaking and the sewage seeps into the groundwater, contaminating it. Municipality mayors, not wanting to cross the voters, do not inspect septic tanks. I would like to sort this out and make a change, but the municipality mayor is already dismissing my questions by providing the records in the form of an empty table with numbers. I have filed a complaint with the court.

Do I understand correctly that the residents found out about the location of the treatment plant from you? Do people come up to you and ask for help?

Yes, they did. There was an outcry when I published information that residents had been unaware of. When they found out and started to protest, the mayor held a meeting to reassure them that the treatment plant would not be smelly or noisy, and despite how small the plot is, the project managed to “squeeze in” there. Despite public resistance, the decision was still not changed and it was claimed that there was no other plot available. It turned out that they were, but the sewer interceptor would have to be extended there, which was considered too expensive. Now people try to ask different questions and actually ask me to help them write an application or a petition. However, the main goal of the residents was to protest against the construction of a sewage treatment plant next door, and the problem is much broader and has existed for several years. It is the lack of a multi-year plan to expand the sanitary sewer system as the municipality makes new land available for development.

Right now we’re talking about problems, but I’m sure you have a lot of successes as well. What has worked?

I can’t provide hard evidence that I brought about any change by asking. There is some indication, however, that various changes have occurred as a result of information disclosure. For example, the fact that I have caused the publication of a register of contracts means that the municipality has to control itself more and finds it more difficult to sign questionable contracts.

The second topic is the state of the municipality report. I volunteered as a participant in the debate and, of course, in the session I pulled out a whole bunch of irregularities in the content of the report, using information I had obtained through access to public information. The effect was that in the following year, the report was much better prepared. Some inconvenient data has been hidden, but some progress is being made.

Another success is stimulating social activity on the bicycle path that was to be built between the Leszno and Błonie municipalities. The Leszno municipality is building a piece of the path up to the border with the Błonie municipality and the Mazovian Voivodship Roads Administration up to the border with the Leszno municipality. Unfortunately, someone did not foresee that the path from Błonie ends 1.5 km before Leszno municipality. I have requested various information, published responses, and ignited the residents’ interest in the problem. The next stage was a petition to the Mazovian Voivodship Roads Administration which was signed by over 300 people over one weekend. We acted quickly and, it seems, effectively. The director of the Roads Administration declared that the path will be “redesigned” next year.

What do you wish Watchdog Poland for its 18th birthday?

Above all, perseverance and consistency. Information about the Watchdog Poland breaks through at many points, but since I’ve been following it on a regular basis, I’ve realised how important and undervalued this activity is, how valuable openness and transparency are. A greater appreciation in the society. And funding, like the 1% this year, so that the Watchdog Poland can fight for transparency rather than focusing on survival.

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This interview was prepared within a series presenting activities of the members of Citizens Network Watchdog Poland on its 18th anniversary.