Prime Minister Vladimir Putin visits Petropalovsk-Kamchatsky and Khabarovsk
Dilapidated housing is an urgent issue for the Kamchatka Territory. Prime Minister Vladimir Putin saw this with his own eyes when a resident of its capital, Petropalovsk-Kamchatsky invited him to visit one of the city's dormitories. The Kamchatka budget allocates several billion roubles for capital repairs and relocation of people from slums but Governor Alexei Kuzmitsky is in no hurry to spend the money. Mr Putin ordered an audit commission from Moscow to visit Kamchatka to speed up the process.
At the end of Mr Putin's three-day visit to Kamchatka, Mr Kuzmitsky was going to show off the construction site for a new earthquake-proof housing estate comprising 17 buildings. He mentioned it at every step in the obvious hope to create an impression. However, local residents obstructed his plan.
On Wednesday night, when Mr Putin walked out of the Life-Giving Holy Trinity Cathedral, he was surrounded by a crowd of women. They told him all about the capital's dilapidated housing. One of them, a 70 year-old woman, invited him to visit her at home. Mr Putin took down the telephone numbers and addresses of the women who addressed their complaints to him and handed them over to the governor with the instruction to demolish dilapidated housing and repair hazardous buildings, or, better still, provide people with new housing. All the more so since the money for this purpose has been allocated.
In the morning Mr Putin accepted the invitation and visited the old woman. She lives with her grandson in a tiny room that measures nine square metres. The prime minister could not contain his indignation:
"To put it mildly, this is very modest, if not very bad," he said on the way to the woman's neighbour who lives a little better: four people in two rooms.
The governor had tried to distract Mr Putin from looking at the slums with assurances that he is aware of the situation but ran into flak:
"You have the money. We transferred more than 3.5 billion roubles to your accounts. You must draft as soon as possible a programme for building new housing: modern and earthquake-proof buildings," Mr Putin interrupted him abruptly. "Your references to the lack of money are unfounded. Start relocating people, first of all from these slums."
However, the construction of new housing is not a profitable business in Kamchatka. Local builders try to repair dilapidated housing as much as they can rather than relocate people into new buildings. The explanation is simple: the Utilities Reform Fund does not allow developers spending its money to increase the cost of one square metre of housing over 30,000 roubles and here it is almost double.
To fulfil Mr Putin's instructions, the Kamchatka authorities will have to immediately draft a regional plan for relocating people from decrepit housing and providing the city with public amenities. The federal government is even ready to help them with funding but only after checking on their financial and economic activities. An audit commission from the Finance Ministry and Regional Development Ministry will fly from Moscow to the region today.
Mr Putin continued his Far Eastern tour in Khabarovsk. Admiring the magnificent view of the Amur River from the observation site on its embankment, he noticed the sports grounds. Teenagers play volleyball there every day. Nobody expected the prime minister to join them. He greeted them, took off his jacket and started playing with obvious pleasure. But having made a number of serves, he decided to quit.
"I'm not very good at volleyball," he laughed and headed for a nearby cafe.
Today Mr Putin will continue his tour of the Far East. He is planning to cover by car about 2,100 km along the new Amur Highway in four days. While on the road, Mr Putin is going to take part in the ground-breaking ceremony at the future Nizhne-Bureyskaya hydropower station, visit the future Vostochny spaceport, open the Russian leg of the Russia-China oil pipeline and meet the builders of the Amur Highway.
By Anastasia Savinykh, Petropalovsk-Kamchatsky, Khabarovsk