On September 2, 2025, Supplementary Law No. 285/2025 was published, approved by the City Council of Rio de Janeiro, regulating the use of Dispute Boards (Committees for the Prevention and Resolution of Disputes) in the municipality’s administrative contracts.
For those who are not yet familiar with the term, Dispute Boards operate as committees of experts that, as a rule, monitor the performance of major contracts, especially infrastructure projects, from the beginning. Their mission is to prevent and resolve conflicts before they turn into disputes that can be costly and time-consuming.
What are the main provisions of the law?
- Contracts may provide, as needed, for permanent committees, responsible for the ongoing monitoring of contract performance, or ad hoc committees, created specifically to resolve, on a case-by-case basis, conflicts that arise during execution.
- Decisions may be recommendatory, binding, or hybrid, always adapted to the terms of the contract.
- There is also the possibility of informal assistance: committee members assist the parties in untangling issues that arise during the course of the contract before the problem escalates.
- The composition of the committee must be made up of capable and trustworthy individuals, selected in a transparent, technical, and impartial manner.
With this regulation, Rio de Janeiro takes an important step in the use of extrajudicial methods, a movement that brings legal certainty, predictability, and continuity to projects that directly impact the population’s daily life.
Rather than viewing the Dispute Board as an “additional cost,” the law reinforces its nature as an investment in contractual governance — capable of preventing work stoppages, preserving relationships, and ensuring that public resources are better allocated.
