"Direct line" with Nikolai Sherstnev: the improvement of cities of district subordination must be in the focus of local authorities

Local authorities must constantly keep the issues of urban improvement in towns of district subordination in focus. This was reminded today by the Chairman of the Vitebsk Regional Executive Committee, Nikolai Sherstnev, during a direct telephone line.

The issue of improving small settlements was raised by a resident of the town of Baran, Orsha District. She addressed the head of the region on behalf of all local young mothers. According to her, significant areas of the town are not mown and are overgrown with bushes, to the extent that it is frightening to walk in places. In addition, children's infrastructure is almost completely absent, and the existing playgrounds are not suitable for walks with children. "Two sandboxes, one carousel, two slides, and 4-5 benches – that's probably all, there isn't even a simple playground," the young woman shared.

The validity of the raised problem was acknowledged by the First Deputy Chairman of the Orsha District Executive Committee, Sergey Pats. "Indeed, we have concentrated our efforts on the district center, Bolbasovo, Kopys, but we have overlooked Baran," he said.

Nikolai Sherstnev instructed to form a working program for the town's improvement in the near future, providing for measures to restore order in public areas and the residential sector.

"I am taking this issue under my personal control, and I will visit Baran in the near future to assess the situation on site," stated the Chairman of the Regional Executive Committee. According to him, there are few towns of district subordination in the Vitebsk region. At the same time, local authorities, concentrating their efforts on key facilities, sometimes forget to maintain elementary order there. "And who will be responsible for arranging children's playgrounds, repairing benches, and pruning plants? It is the local authorities that must organize this work, including in cooperation with enterprises whose employees use the infrastructure," noted Nikolai Sherstnev.

Issues of urban area improvement and road surfacing predominated during the region's head's communication with citizens. A total of 27 appeals were received during the direct line, with almost 60% of them relating to the topic of tidying up in one way or another. The most frequent callers were residents of Vitebsk (about 67%), as well as Polotsk and Orsha. For example, residents of houses on Lokomotivnaya Street in the regional centre asked the governor to assist in restoring the green zone on the adjacent territory. During the construction of the "Polotsky" overpass, a temporary road ran through it, and after the completion of the construction, no one was in a hurry to tidy up.

A number of other calls concerned issues of road surfacing improvement in the private sector of the regional centre. Nikolai Sherstnev instructed the leadership of the Vitebsk City Executive Committee to allocate resources for measures to maintain roads and sidewalks in remote residential areas in proper condition when planning road network improvement works.

According to Ilona Shulga, Head of the Department for Work with Appeals from Citizens and Legal Entities of the Vitebsk Regional Executive Committee, 24 assignments were given during the previous telephone line of the Chairman of the Regional Executive Committee in March, of which almost 88% were completed. In total, over six months of the current year, 325 appeals were received during the direct telephone lines organised by the Regional Executive Committee, which is approximately 10% more than in the same period of 2019. As Ilona Shulga noted, this year residents of the region prefer remote communication, as indicated by the reduction in appeals during personal meetings at the Regional Executive Committee. The thematic focus of the issues remains traditional - housing and communal services, healthcare, road infrastructure, social services, land use, labour, and employment.