نشریه اقتصاد و برنامه ریزی شهری
سال دوم شماره 5 (بهار 1389)

Loday, government, understanding the centralized administrative limitations, have delegated many public services to province and local governments through decentralization, or if possible, moving toward privatization and attract direct investment of private sector into urban services. After revelation in Iran and following the rapid growth in population, the demand for urban services increased unprecedented. It is expected in the future that, regarding the increase in population growth (however slower than before), increase of citizens per capita income and delegation of more responsibilities to municipalities, this demand will have an upward trend. As we know, the delogation of government responsibilities to municipalities was forecasted in Article 136 of the third plan law and clause B in Article 137 of the forth plan law. It is expected that, despite the slow motion in the implementation of this policy, centralized administration shortcomings make the government to move more steadily in this direction. The repid increase in urban population of the country as well as delegation of some government responsibilities to municipalities will increase seriously financial needs of the municipalities. Although the government has promised to project and appropriate the needed budget along with this delegation, but it is evident that the central government itself faces difficulty in providing its budget resources and regarding its financial limitations will not be able to actually allocate public resources to current and capital expenses of municipalities. The increasing gap between the revenue resources and expenditures of municipalities has already put some of the municipalities in small and major cities of the country in a difficult situation. Thus, it doesnt seem that the central government payments to municipalities can fill this financial gap alone. There fore, municipalities resort to financial markets in order to equip financial resources will be necessary and inevitable in the future more than today. There is no reason, in major urban development projects which has a long utilizing period and benefit different generations, that the existing generation bear the financial burden of then. This article tries to explain briefly the common principles and concepts in financial markets and then evaluate the historic and current condition of professional financial institutions and legal bases for municipal borrowing. In third section we address lehran municipality performance in regard to borrowing from financial markets and evaluate existing shortcomings. Finally, we present appropriate strategies and policies on the establishment of necessary Institutional and legal bases as well as improvement of credit worthiness of the municipality

In recent years Urban planning has developed in Iran in recent years, however it has some short comings. Now, rarely you find an city without a comprehensive or detailed plan. But one of the challenges facing all these plans is lack of adequate resources for implementation. Al though financial capacity and structure of urban management for plan implementation are usually addressed in comprehensive plans. But these studies do not meet informational needs of urban managers and usually they face with lack of adequate resources and inefficiency in allocation of them Regarding these issues, providing back – up plans – capable of reforming urban finance structure in order to manage required recourses for implementation – for comprehensive plans is a necessity to make urban development plans achievable.

The rapid growth of urbanization and the struggle to develop more favorable life quality levels have caused many concerns for governments، particularly local governments، through out the world. The increase in urban population has had many consequences such as the growth of informal settlements and urban poverty، and establishment of urban infrastructures in order to respond some of the challenges facing and develop a better life quality for citizens، is a necessary which has become increasingly evident. But the establishment of urban infrastructures needs a considerable capital، in some cases ten times more than the existing capacity of public sector. Thus، finding new financial methods in order to respond urban life requirements is crucial. PPP (private public partnership) is a method which has been used over two past decades in various parts of the world and has had remarkable results and successes. This method، using private sector capitals، increases considerably public – sector capacity in order to provide more expands and qualitative services. This article tries to consider various aspects and requirements of this method.