The Competition Council (KP) investigated the procurement documentation of Riga City Municipality's city improvement projects, identifying restrictions such as specifying certain manufacturers for elements like benches and waste bins, which hindered offering equivalents. This led to negotiations with the municipality to prevent similar situations in future procurements.

Several complaints were received by KP regarding competition-limiting conditions in an open city improvement tender by Riga City Municipality. After reviewing the tender rules and contracts, KP concluded that the municipality needed to take actions to prevent risks of non-compliance with Competition Law in current and future city improvement procurements.

KP advised the municipality to revise the unified style manual project to avoid creating a situation where the city's unified style for improvement elements is based on specific brand products. Additionally, improvements in the technical specifications were recommended, including only essential technical parameters and allowing for equivalent offerings, broadening the pool of potential bidders.

To prevent similar issues in the future, KP, with representatives from the Procurement Monitoring Bureau, held talks with Riga City Municipality. As a result, the municipality committed to avoiding overly detailed product specifications in future procurement procedures and using references to specific brands only as visual examples.

The municipality also pledged to update technical specifications to include the option of offering equivalents, defining the range of differences in equivalent characteristics, and no longer specifying unique manufacturers and models for certain improvement elements without distinctive visual features.

Furthermore, the municipality committed to enhancing the evaluation system for bidders, giving equal points in cases where proposed delivery times do not significantly differ, ensuring fair competition in the procurement process.