The City of Joensuu provides its residents with various services, some of which are statutory. The city’s services include education and early childhood education services, cultural, youth, library and sports services, urban planning and land use, water and waste management services and environmental services.
 

Cooperation with other municipalities

The City of Joensuu provides services to residents itself and in some cases in cooperation with other municipalities. For example, the city is responsible for organising the services of libraries, adult education centres, public transport and waste management authorities for other municipalities.
 

Purchase of services

The City of Joensuu employs around 2,800 people and personnel expenses make up about half of the City’s total annual expenditure.

In addition to the city's own personnel, some of the operations are organised by purchasing services from other service providers. Purchases of services account for about a third of the city’s total expenditure. The city tenders out the services it purchases as a public operator, taking into account the requirements of the Act on Public Procurement and Concession Contracts. Under certain conditions, the services can also be purchased from companies partially owned by the city.

The largest single group of purchased services is made up of purchases of transport services. This includes in particular public transport services as well as school transport. Another significant group consists of the purchases of construction and maintenance services for the areas.

Other major groups pf purchased services include municipality of residence reimbursement (e.g. Normaalikoulu) and early childhood education service vouchers through which the city participates in the costs of private early childhood education. In addition, ICT services, catering services (in practice school and day care meals) and the cleaning services of city premises are also significant groups of purchased services.

There are various reasons for purchasing services. Especially in different types of support services, purchasing services can lead to a more economical and high-quality end result than producing the services yourself. For example, the provision of services may require special skills or investments, in which case it is justified to organise the services in a larger unit.

On the other hand, private service providers can diversify the provision of services, for example in early childhood education services. The purchase of services may also be justified, for example when the need for a particular service is not continuous or the need varies.
 

Organisation of services and economic adaptation

As part of the economic adaptation process, alternative ways of organising and producing services are being evaluated. The review may include, for example, considering switching from purchased services to producing our own service in its place. An alternative could also be to reorganise operations within the city’s organisation. The number of purchased services can also be influenced by reviewing the content of the agreements.
 

Examples of costs of purchased services