ABSTRACT. The Urban Institute (UI) worked with fi ve cities in post-Soviet Kyrgyzstan to apply better management practices through the development of Strategic Land Management Plans. Kyrgyzstan transferred property to local governments, but municipal land management had remained poor owing to a proliferation of responsible agencies, lack of rule of law, corruption, and passiveness on the part of local governments. UI worked with local governments to make an inventory of municipal land, publicize the results, and develop a strategy that articulated principles for land management and an implementation plan. This led to several improvements including proper registration of parcels and proactive policies to lease and sell land through open competition. It also established a model for determining public policy that countered corruption and public deliberation of costs and benefi ts in the use of local assets. Donor involvement to promote good land legislation, the property registration system, and decentralization was also critical to success.

As a result of government decentralization and property devolution from central to local governments, many city governments in transition countries became the largest real property owners in urban areas. For transitional countries lacking suf®cient democratic traditions, ef®cient asset management represents a dramatic and multifaceted challenge. Kyrgyzstan happened to be among the ®rst transitional countries where cities obtained systematic technical assistance in adapting the most advanced methodology of municipal asset management, which was recently developed under the auspices of the World Bank. Based on experience of work within ®ve pilot cities, the article summarizes factors and methods that help develop a sense of strong ownership and internalization of new asset management vision and approaches among local of®cials and elected members of city councils. The article presents the experience of how the government of Uzgen, a city of about 40,000 people in South Kyrgyzstan, has changed its attitudes and approach regarding management of municipal property. The article demonstrates how two key pro-cessesÐimproving professional aspects of municipal asset management and developing local democracy though public invol-vementÐhave been reinforced by each other. One of the main lessons from Uzgen's experience is that municipal property asset managementÐbecause it deals with tangible issuesÐis a perfect focal point for developing local democracy and communication between a local population and its government.

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