with the regional prosecutor's office

Yesterday, at a press conference in Pyatigorsk, the mayor of the city, Vladimir Shestopalov, commented on the results of an investigation released by the regional prosecutor's office into the facts of illegal privatization of municipal property by the previous administration, indicated in his letter to the Security Council of the region and personally to the President of the Russian Federation Vladimir Putin (for the conflict between the Pyatigorsk mayor and the regional prosecutor's office, see " Kommersant No. 65 and No. 70). He called the prosecutor's report "quick, clear and untrue." According to him, new materials are now being prepared, which will be provided to the Prosecutor General's Office in the very near future. The regional prosecutor's office has not yet responded to Mr. Shestopalov's new statements. At his press conference, Mr. Shestopalov, in particular, explained the reason for the lack of documents confirming the illegality of the privatization of a number of objects in the city of Pyatigorsk. According to him, he transferred the materials of the inspection carried out by the new city administration to the FSB. Now he considers it possible to begin publishing these materials in the press. In particular, Vladimir Shestopalov intends to once again raise the issue of selling to a certain private party the debts of the municipal enterprise Teploset, with which the city administration, under the leadership of his predecessor, unexpectedly paid off with bills from the Savings Bank, and the enterprise was declared bankrupt and changed ownership.

Vladimir Shestopalov also recalled that the check carried out by his specialists on the validity of the tariffs of Stavropol Kraivodokanal showed their absolute far-fetchedness. According to him, Stavropol Kraivodokanal calculated them based on the daily water consumption rate of 10.5 cubic meters per person. However, as the mayor stated, measurements showed that this norm turned out to be more than twice as high. “It is clear that the networks are 80% worn out, but why, by setting an inflated tariff, did the water utility not take care of repairs? Where did the money go then?

The mayor is also interested in the question of where the 36 million rubles allocated from the regional budget in 2002 for the repair of roads in the city disappeared. “Even if I myself had carried out terrorist attacks and planted bombs on the roads, they probably would not have been in such a state,” Mr. Shestopalov said at a press conference.

The mayor also spoke about his conflict with power grids. From the city budget, up to 20 million rubles are spent annually in Pyatigorsk electrical networks for city lighting and reconstruction of networks. As officials of the city administration found out, the electric networks, when submitting information for payment, inflated the cost of all materials that were used during repairs, and also inflated the coefficients when calculating tariffs for the cost of electricity in the city.

“If you think that they are not offering me a share, then you are mistaken, they are offering me, but I refuse,” the mayor told reporters.

Then he again returned to assessing the response of the regional prosecutor's office to his earlier statements. According to Mr. Shestopalov, “this is just the beginning of the fight” that he intends to wage. Now the mayor of Pyatigorsk is preparing new materials, which, as he promised, will be provided to the Prosecutor General’s Office in the very near future.

The regional prosecutor's office has not yet responded to Vladimir Shestopalov's new statements.

ALEXANDRA LARINTSEVA, Pyatigorsk

Kommersant (Rostov) No. 72 from 04/22/2005, p. 12

Pyatigorsk mayor got into an argument