The obligatory own tasks of a municipality:

• developing and implementing a municipal strategy for solving social problems with a particular consideration of social assistance programmes, prevention and solving alcohol and other problems, aimed at the integration of persons and families from special risk groups;
• drawing up an assessment of social assistance resources on the grounds of an analysis of a local social and demographic situation;
• providing shelter, a meal and necessary clothing to persons devoid thereof;
• granting and paying periodical benefits;
• granting and paying designated benefits;
• granting and paying designated benefits to cover expenses resulting from a fortuitous event;
• granting and paying designated benefits to cover expenses on health benefits to the homeless and other persons without income and a possibility to obtain benefits on the grounds of provisions on healthcare benefits funded with public resources;
• granting designated benefits in a form of a funded ticket;
• paying retirement pension and social security pension contributions for a person who resigns from employment due to the necessity to take direct and personal care of a chronically or terminally ill family member and a mother, a father or a sibling not living together;
• social work;
• organising and providing care services, including specialist, at a place of residence with an exclusion of specialist care services for persons with mental disorders;   
• running and ensuring places in protected homes;
• providing extra meals to children;
• funding funerals, including those of the homeless;
• referring to a residential home and paying for the municipality’s inhabitant’s stay therein;
• helping persons with difficulties in adjusting to life after release from a penal institution;
• drawing up reports and forwarding them to the relevant voivode in a form of an electronic document with the use of the information and communication system;
• establishing and maintaining a social assistance centre, including providing funds for employees’ remunerations;
• granting and paying permanent benefits;
• paying health insurance contributions stipulated in provisions on healthcare benefits funded with public resources.

The municipality’s own tasks:

• granting and paying special designated benefits;
• granting and paying support for becoming economically independent in a form of benefits, loans and assistance in kind;
• running and ensuring places in municipal residential homes and support centres and referring thereto persons requiring care;
• developing and implementing social projects;
• undertaking other measures in the scope of social assistance resulting from identified needs of a municipality, including development and implementation of support programmes;
• cooperating with a poviat employment office in the scope of distributing job offers and information on vacancies, distributing information on professional counselling services and trainings and implementation of the Activation and Inclusion Programme, referred to in the provisions on the employment promotion and labour market institutions.

Tasks ordered in the scope of the government administration executed by the municipality:

• organising and providing specialist care services at a place of residence for persons with mental disorders;
• granting and paying designated benefits to cover expenses related to the natural or ecological disaster;
• running and developing the infrastructure of support centres for persons with mental disorders;
• executing tasks resulting from governmental social assistance programmes aimed at protecting the level of life of persons, families and social groups, as well as development of specialist support;
• granting and paying designated benefits, as well as providing shelter, meals and necessary clothing to foreigners staying in the territory of the Republic of Poland on the grounds of the certificate referred to in Article 170 of the Act of 12 December 2013 on foreigners, or on the grounds of the certificate referred to in Article 176 of the Act of 12 December 2013 on foreigners;
• granting and paying designated benefits, as well as providing shelter, meals and necessary clothing to foreigners, who have been given a permit for stay due to humanitarian reasons or a permit for tolerated stay in the territory of the Republic of Poland;
• paying remuneration for providing care.

The poviat’s own tasks:

• developing and implementing poviat strategy of solving social problems with a special consideration of social assistance programmes, supporting persons with disabilities and other, aimed at the integration of persons and families from groups at a special risk - upon consultation with municipalities relevant in terms of territory;
• running specialist counselling;
• granting financial support to become independent and continue education to persons leaving residential homes for children and youth with intellectual disabilities, residential homes for mothers with minor children and pregnant women and shelters for minors, reformatory establishments, special school and education centres, special education centres, youth socio-therapy centres providing twenty four hours care or youth educational centres;
• helping in integration in the environment of persons having difficulties in adjusting to life, the youth leaving residential homes for children and youth with intellectual disabilities, residential homes for mothers with minor children and pregnant women and shelters for minors, reformatory establishments, special school and education centres, special education centres, youth socio-therapy centres having shortages in adjustment;
• helping foreigners, who have obtained a refugee status in the Republic of Poland, subsidiary protection or temporary residence permit granted due to the circumstances referred to in Article 159 par. 1 section 1 letter c or d of the Act of 12 December 2013 on foreigners, having difficulties with integration in the environment;
• running and developing the infrastructure of supramunicipal residential homes and placing referred persons therein;
• running protected apartments for persons from an area of more than one municipality and poviat support centres, including homes for mothers with minor children and pregnant women with an exclusion of community self-help homes and other support centres for persons with mental disorders;
• running crisis intervention centres;
• giving information on rights and entitlements;
• professional training and development of poviat social assistance personnel;
• methodological counselling for managers and employees of the poviat social assistance organisational unit;
• undertaking other measures resulting from the identified needs of a municipality, including development and implementation of support programmes;
• drawing up reports and forwarding them to the relevant voivode in a form of an electronic document with the use of the information and communication system;
• drawing up an assessment of social assistance resources on the grounds of an analysis of a local social and demographic situation;
• establishing and maintaining a poviat family assistance centre, including providing funds for employees’ remunerations.

Tasks in the scope of the government administration executed by the poviat:

• helping foreigners, who have obtained a refugee status in the Republic of Poland, subsidiary protection or temporary residence permit granted due to the circumstances referred to in Article 159 par. 1 section 1 letter c or d of the Act of 12 December 2013 on foreigners, in the scope of the individual integration programme and paying for such persons healthcare insurance contributions stipulated in provisions on healthcare benefits funded with public resources;
• running and developing the infrastructure of support centres for persons with mental disorders;
• execution of tasks resulting from governmental social assistance programmes aimed at protecting the level of life of persons, families and social groups, as well as development of specialist support;
• providing foreigners staying in the territory of the Republic of Poland on the grounds of the certificate referred to in Article 170 of the Act of 12 December 2013 on foreigners, or on the grounds of the permit referred to in Article 176 of the Act of 12 December 2013 on foreigners, with assistance in the scope of crisis intervention.

The voivodeship local government tasks include:

• developing, updating and implementing voivodeship strategy in the scope of social policy constituting an integral part of the voivodeship strategy development including, in particular, the following programmes: preventing social exclusion, equalisation of opportunities of persons with disabilities, social assistance, preventing and solving alcohol problems, cooperation with non-governmental organisations – upon consultations with poviats;
• organising education, including running public social services schools and professional training for social assistance personnel;
• identifying reasons of poverty and developing regional social assistance programmes supporting local governments in measures undertaken to limit this phenomenon;
• diagnosing and monitoring selected social problems in the region;
• inspiring and promoting new solutions in the scope of social assistance;
• coordinating measures to the benefit of social economy sector in the region;
• organising and running regional social assistance organisational units;
• drawing up reports and forwarding them to the relevant voivode in a form of an electronic document with the use of the information and communication system;
• drawing up an assessment of social assistance resources on the grounds of an analysis of the local social and demographic situation on the grounds of assessments drawn up by municipalities and poviats from the voivodeship, taking into consideration the social issues and problems resulting from the adopted strategy together with drafts of regional social assistance programmes and submitting them to the relevant voivode until 31 July each year;
• establishing and maintaining a regional social policy centre, including providing funds for employees’ remunerations;

Voivodes’ tasks:

• stipulating the manner of performing tasks in the scope of governmental administration performed by territorial self-government units;
• stating compliance of the repair programmes in the scope of reaching standards in social assistance organisational units and assessment of implementation level thereof;
• issuing and withdrawing permits or contingent permits to run residential homes, as well as issuing and withdrawing permits to run establishments providing twenty-four-hour care for persons with disabilities, persons with chronic diseases, the elderly, including those run on the grounds of the economic activity provisions;
• keeping a register of residential homes, establishments providing twenty-four-hour care to persons with disabilities, persons with chronic diseases or the elderly, including those run on the grounds of the economic activity provisions, places providing temporary shelter and specialist counselling units;
• coordinating measures undertaken in the scope of the integration of foreigners, who have obtained a refugee status, subsidiary protection or temporary residence permit in the Republic of Poland granted due to the circumstances referred to in Article 159 par. 1 section 1 letter c or d of the Act of 12 December 2013 on foreigners, in particular, in the scope of indicating a place of residence, as well as keeping a register of approved, individual integration programmes;
• performing or ordering to territorial self-government units or non-public entities tasks resulting from governmental programmes;
• supervising the implementation of municipal, poviat and voivodeship government’s tasks’ implementation, including the quality of social assistance organisational units and the quality of services with regard to which the Minister relevant for social security stipulated standards, as well as compliance of employment of the social assistance organisational units with required qualifications;
• controlling the quality of services by non-public entities on the grounds of an agreement with government and local government administration authorities;
• controlling the quality of services provided by residential homes run not by an order of a territorial self-government unit’s body, by non-public entities referred to in Article 57 par. 1 sections 2–4 of the Act on Social Assistance;
• controlling entities providing twenty-four-hour care for persons with disabilities, persons with chronic diseases or the elderly, including those run pursuant to the provisions on economic activity, in the scope of social and well-being services’ standards and respecting rights of such persons;
• analysing the state and effectiveness of social assistance on the grounds of the assessment of social assistance resources adopted by voivodeship self-government with a consideration of assumptions provided in such a strategy;
• drawing up reports and forwarding them to the minister relevant for social security in a form of an electronic document with the use of the information and communication system; 
• performing tasks stipulated by the minister relevant for social security in the scope of maintaining and developing the IT system in social assistance organisational units in voivodeship, as well as co-financing and supervising functioning thereof;
• financially supporting programmes in the social assistance area stipulated by the voivode, implemented by territorial self-government units or authorised entities referred to in Article 25 par. 1 of the Act on Social Assistance;   
• coordinating, within the social assistance system, measures undertaken in the scope of preventing human trafficking and support provided to victims thereof.

Tasks of the minister relevant for social security:

• developing the conception and stipulating the directions of development in the social assistance area;
• ordering and financing research, expertise and analyses in the social assistance area;
• monitoring standards;
• analysing social assistance’s effectiveness;
• inspiring and promoting new forms and methods of activity, as well as training staff;
• substantial supervision over training in the scope of social assistance organisation and specialisation in social employee occupation as well as over training for social work supervisors;
• developing and financing support programmes;
• financially supporting programmes in the social assistance area stipulated by the minister, implemented by territorial self-government units or authorised entities;
• stipulating public administration tasks in the scope of maintaining and developing the IT system in social assistance organisational units in voivodeships, transferring funds for co-financing and supervising functioning thereof;
• co-operating with non-government organisations.