Planning The Utilization Of Financial Resources To The Municipal Councils In West Bank In Light Of The Changes On The Palestinian Arena Setting

This study aimed to the clarify the planning reality of the utilization of financial resources to the West Bank municipal councils in the light of the economic transformations, which is of great importance both to the municipality, in order to carry out their duties to society, and in building strategies for the protection of municipal resources. The researcher has found that there is dire need for financial planning following the basic foundations of its success planning in order to protection of the financial resources of municipalities and to ease their integration in Palestinian arena that is manifested Israeli incursions and invasions of Palestinian territories. Such incursions have dramatically affected the economic situation of municipalities, increase in unemployment, due to closure of cities and towns thus making travel between cities and towns more difficult. In addition to the fact that the results of late elections of municipal councils made it more difficult municipalities to generate funding from donors due to boycott. The researcher, has developed and distributed a questionnaire for the purpose of study. The questionnaire was distributed to municipal councils in the West Bank (Nablus, Jenin, Qalqilya, Jericho, Ramallah, Al Bireh, Hebron, Bethlehem). The questionnaire comprised of 50 items and distributed to a sample of (35) of financial managers and accountants in the municipalities. The questionnaire has stability factor of (87.11%). Using the statistical package for social sciences (SPSS) major findings were revealed: 1 - The results of the first hypothesis reveal that there is no significant differences between males and females in their approach to the issue of planning the utilization of financial resources for municipal councils in Palestine. 2 - The results of the second hypothesis show that there were significant differences between the qualifications of staff on the subject planning the utilization of financial resources for municipal councils in Palestine. 3 - The results of the third hypothesis that there are differences between staff and department heads and managers in their approach to the issue of planning the utilization of financial resources for municipal councils in Palestine, the differences were found in favors of heads of departments. 4 - The results of the fourth hypothesis indicate that there are no differences between staff with regard to their professional experiences in their approach to the issue of planning the utilization of financial resources for municipal councils in Palestine. 5 - The results of the fifth hypothesis however, show that there are no differences in responses between staff based on the differences in professionalism levels in their approach to the issue of planning the utilization of financial resources for municipal councils in Palestine. The municipal of Nablus, was taken as case study of West Bank municipalities. Based on that impact of the financial changes will be applied following the financial analysis for municipality in the period between 002-2007 taking into account the impact of economic changes on the budget of municipalities shown in appendix. Following a proposed strategy for the developing the budget for municipality. The study proposed a set of recommendations including: The need to link financial planning in the municipality with the calculation of financial estimates for access to the targets which had been identified, and the need to link with best tools and techniques for reaching goals and objectives, and must seek proper planning in the municipality to achieve the link between economic development and social development, and also have clear strategy for business financial planning before the start of the fiscal year. However, the difficulties lie in the fluctuation of revenues and expenditure of the municipality. The study proposed some alternatives that could confine such fluctuation among them good and proper planning which will lead to better utilization of resource through establishment of follow up and monitoring committee and also establishment of a planning unit within municipality called department of budgeting and planning. The unit will comprise a team specialist that will help encourage investment in the city of Nablus.