Three or four years ago Reni was a dilapidated and ugly city with huge debts. I cannot even recall the number of its creditors. There were no good roads and we needed more bridges. Lack of city gas pipelines was a major irritant as many boiler houses used coal or fuel oil and between 60 and 70% of the residents, including those living in multistoried houses, instead of using natural gas, bought propane or butane in cylinders, at high daily risks to their lives. Wage arrears were also a problem.
However, in three and a half years we have succeeded in paying off our wage and salary arrears to the employees of local utility companies, kindergartens, and others, as well as city debts to other cities and organizations. We have expanded the then existing gas pipeline system ten times over, beginning to supply natural gas to boiler houses and between 80 and 85% of the residents of multistory buildings. This removed the risks to life and made it possible for Reni residents to save: instead of paying 40 to 50 hryvnias for a cylinder of gas they pay 3 hryvnias monthly on their gas bills today. Incidentally, we also succeeded in scrapping all public housing and utility companies and creating private entities to take charge of housing. Service standards rose, new entities began to repair doorways, roofs, communications, and even the fronts of buildings. Collection rates for utility payments rose. But most stringent saving and quick actions are still needed. The bottom line for all this restructuring is that quality goes up and utility bills come down.
We have modernized twenty-five streets, paving with asphalt several central ones, and made hard covering for formerly impassable suburban streets. We have also laid five bridges across the hollow, thus making these areas accessible for pedestrians and vehicles. These seem to be trifles but our life consists mainly of such details.
At first, Reni residents eyed these changes with suspicion. When we liquidated the housing and utility enterprises within three months, people were worried but then they saw that new pipes are being laid, doorways and roofs repaired. No longer worrying about their old problems, they begin to raise new ones, water and heat supply. This means the needs of Reni residents are growing. We are currently seeking investment and loans to replace our water and heat supply systems, because the old ones are rusted and obsolete, very energy and cost-intensive, and require a large service staff. The systems can be replaced but not in two weeks, of course.
Besides, Reni has a port that is almost a ruin. Now we have managed to stop its disintegration and even obtained slight growth, paying back wages to port employees.
In these three years we have done something which lays the foundation for Reni to become a sociopolis; we have ensured the enactment of a law making Reni a free economic zone. It was not easy and the government passed six resolutions on Reni, but our FEZ finally got off the ground and we began to implement investment projects. We had to do a large amount of work this year, with dozens of delegations and potential investors visiting the city. As a result, the implementation of four projects will begin by yearend.
The first project, soybean processing to obtain soy oil, lecithin, and soy chocolate, will be implemented by the Canadian-British Meridian Company. The project’s total cost is $30 million, $26 million for plant construction and $4 million to buy soy. The soybeans will be imported from Argentina and the United States, undergo processing in Reni, and then be shipped by barge to buyers in Bulgaria, Hungary, and elsewhere. It is a lucrative and environmentally safe project based on the latest technology. The number of new jobs is not large, a mere 46, but the project makes it possible to keep 100 jobs in the port. That is, we want the port to operate, first, as a port per se and, second, as a trading outlet for the entire FEZ. We are seeking investors with inputs, new technologies, money, and markets.
A second project is in timber, a third on liquid gas, and the fourth involves modernization of our port quays. We are currently working on eight more projects. They are all foreign investment projects except for one funded by a Luhansk company. This one does not require much investment but it creates about 250 new jobs. This project involves the assembly of boilers and their sale in Moldova and Romania. This is of vital importance for the city because we have plans to scrap boiler houses and replace them within two to three years with individual boilers to save gas and cut utility bills.
These transformations were initiated by me as city mayor and the Reni executive council. The council approved the city development program, with the vital issues put up for consideration by city council deputies. I am content that our deputies take city development to heart, and we always have 98% support. We look for new ideas in Poland and the Baltic states.
Reni is not yet a sociopolis but it will become the one in one or two years. It seems to me that the city has God’s blessing. No wonder there is a planet called Reni in space. Geographically, Reni has for millennia held a certain interest for conquerors: Romans, Turks, Russians, even Trojans were all here. There were many battles in this area. The would-be sociopolis (Reni plus two villages, Dolynske and Lymanske) has an ideal geographical location, with just one road leading to Ukraine, one to Romania, and one to Moldova. Customs points lie in all directions. All this makes Reni an ideal economic testing ground for Ukraine, with four European transport corridors going through the city (in its time, the Great Silk Road also went through Reni), and a port costing at least half a billion dollars. The port ranked fourth or fifth in the former Soviet Union and Reni was a kind of a satellite city. There is also a ferry crossing which the Soviets planned to use as a transshipping facility on the way from Europe to Turkey, Iran and further on. Reni also has a modern highway, and wide and narrow guage railroad to Europe. Currently, they are designing an eight- lane highway to Europe via Reni.
Apart from this, since Reni is located along one of the international air corridors, there are plans to build an international airport for cargo planes here. In addition, surveyors found oil and gas at a depth of 550 meters and an ocean of purest drinking water. The combination of all these factors (geographical position, transport infrastructure, the Danube, mineral deposits, and, most importantly, the commitment of Reni residents and the local government, will allow us to build a sociopolis.
Today, we have support at the highest political level from the NDSC and other bodies. The desire exists at the grassroots, residents, and Reni authorities. But we do not have understanding at the middle level of district and oblast structures. At present, these mediators are our greatest brake and burden. We must get rid of them, both in business and in politics. Middlemen constitute a surplus link, surplus staff who must be retrained. This is sloppy management when local councils have meager budgets, and the intermediaries seize the profits and divide them however they want. In my view, anticipatory development consists not merely in attracting the latest technologies but in getting rid of go-betweens. The transformations going on in Reni are viewed by oblast leaders with disapproval because they understand only too well that tomorrow they will have to retrain, or leave their cushy posts and find new jobs.
If small cities and villages get off the ground economically, Ukraine will also prosper. This kind of work must start at the grassroots. There was, is, and will be everything in Kyiv, because it’s the capital.
