Rock-n Roll has died, the stupid-not yet

Zhukovsky People's Council, created as the Moscow Region Analogue of the Coordinating Council of the Opposition, holds elections

The CSR has not existed for a long time, and in Zhukovsky from April 19 to May 19 they choose the second composition. How it happened - the New Times sorted out

To get to the city of Zhukovsky near Moscow, you need to sit on an electric train from the Novaya station near the Aviamotornaya metro station. Half an hour on the way, and you are already on the Zhukovskaya railway platform "Rest". Here is freshness and coolness: immediately behind the station stalls - a pine grove. Last year, a local construction company was attempted for these trees, which through the court tried to get a permission to cut down. The city administration licked the courts sluggishly until the Zhukovsky People’s Council (GU) joined the problem. The fact that the grove is still standing is his merit. Well, at least, members of the Council say so.

The New Times wrote about this small but proud analogue of the coordination council of the opposition (KS) in January last year*, when local activists were just preparing for the first elections.

There is no big, Moscow COP - it was dismissed in October 2013. And Zhukovsky - not only successfully worked for a year, but already holds elections to the new composition.

How did they succeed?

Cuba

At the end of the working day, volunteers install three campaign cubes in the city, similar to the famous agitation cubes of Navalny. Here, local residents who do not trust the Internet or simply do not know anything about the Zhukovsky People’s Council, can receive information about candidates and cast their vote. On the day the New Times correspondent visited the city, one cube stood at the monument to Nikolai Zhukovsky and two more at the Central Aerohydrodynamic Institute and the Flight Research Institute named after Gromova. Every day activists change points.

Cube near the Central Aerohydrodynamic Institute in Zhukovsky/ Photo: Alexander Lita

The “Cubes” depict photos of 11 candidates and a detailed report on the work of the GUNC for the year. When local residents come up and ask what is happening, volunteers reply that the Council is a structure that deals with urban problems. About politics - not a word. Activists and council members estimate the recognition of their organization among the population at about 40%.

“Cuba is a chic idea, people are suitable because they are simply curious,” said Aelita Znamenskaya, deputy. The editor -in -chief of the newspaper Zhukovsky Vesti, the deputy of the first convocation of the GUNS and the candidate for the new composition. Last summer, she went to Moscow to agitate for Alexei Navalny.

Laptops and modems for voting were bought even on last year’s elections. Like the elections in the CSR, the opposition elections in Zhukovsky are held on the electronic platform "Democracy - 2" Leonid Volkov. You can vote “on cubes”, you can from the house on the Internet, but the main thing is to show a passport with Zhukovskaya registration.

“I heard about the MST out of my ear, I can’t say anything about it. I’ll look at their site first, ”the elderly employee of the Central Aerohydrodynamic Institute answered the question of The New Times. He did not stay near the Cube next to the enterprise - he was in a hurry home.

The young entrepreneur Nikolai, who got acquainted with the information in Cuba, admitted that he had not heard about the GUNS before, but now, of course, he would vote, because the Council opens against commercial development in the city center - “And this is right”.

There are also loyal supporters among local - as a pensioner Svetlana who came to vote. “It was not a week that the GPS did not gather, there was no week that there was no quorum for making decisions in the GU, the agenda of the meetings was always published on the Internet,” Svetlana listed the merits of the Council. - Everyone knows that on Thursday you can come to their meeting and offer your question for discussion. Previously, public activity developed bursts. Something didn’t like something-they ran and smoke, then they seemed to be going to do something, but the phones lost each other. Now it is put on a clear basis. ”

Without politics

The head of the election committee both in last year and in the current elections to the Council is the leader of the local “Yabloko”, 57 -year -old entrepreneur Fedor Karpov. He recalls that the opposition backbone from local activists arose in the wake of 2012 protests against the cutting of the Tsagovsky forest in Zhukovsky - in promotions that periodically grew into serious clashes with the security of companies that cut down the forest, thousands of citizens took part. One of the first steps of the then acting governor of the Moscow Region Andrei Vorobyov in early 2013 was the displacement of the mayor of Zhukovsky Alexander Bobovnikov - "Due to the loss of confidence in the inhabitants." The scale of deforestation was seriously reduced.

Candidates for Zhukovsky People's Council

The idea of ​​its own collegial body among Zhukovsky activists arose in the winter of 2013, when they prepared an election site for voting in the elections of the Coordinating Council of the opposition. Zhukovsky Council arose on the basis of a local opposition newspaper. Members of the editorial office entered the Council, and weekly meetings are traditionally held in the Zhukovsky Vesti premises. The newspaper also provides information support for the work of the Council.

Elections to the first composition of the GRC were held in the spring of 2013, two thousand citizens then chose 15 “people's deputies” within a month. The organizers hope that the turnout this time will not be lower. But 11 people agreed to elect in the new composition - the fewer people, the easier it is to agree, agree on positions and work productively. On April 30, 590 citizens voted in the election. 19 candidates apply for 11 seats. When voting from them, you can choose no more than five people.

As for financing, the current election in the GUNS is probably the cheapest in Russian history. Candidates, activists of the election committee and sympathizers in the folding spent 100 thousand rubles on them. Cubes were ordered with this money and leaflets were printed.

“Regular elections are needed in order for us to understand whether people support us,” says Mikhail Yuritsyn, a young man with a bicycle and in a tracksuit, ”says a member of the first convocation and a second convocation candidate.“ Secondly, this can be presented to the authorities. Some Zhukovsky deputies say: residents support me. We answer - look, people also voted for us. ”

Yuritsyn works as an engineer, with the authorities agreed on a free work schedule in order to manage to engage in social activities. Like the rest of the candidates, he himself stands on cubes daily and campaigning citizens to vote. The head of the election committee Fedor Karpov is also on the cubes, and after the picket he takes the “props” on his “Audi”.

Unlike the CSR, the GUNS really gathered for a whole year every week and concentrated not on politics, but on urban problems.
“We have a fraction of ecologists, there are those who are engaged in point development. There is also a fraction of the Communists, but we are trying to move away from those that we do not go. For example, we decided to freeze the discussion of Crimea. Still a long time ago they decided that it was not necessary to talk about Stalin with Communist Semenov-and we get along very well, ”says Aelita Znamenskaya.

The Council worked with initiative groups of citizens against point development, deforestation of urban forests, helped owners of private houses, to which the city administration seriously increased land tax, etc. Active Zhukovites who are fighting for their rights with the local authorities, the Council found lawyers for trials, helped organize pickets and signatures collection

The central theme of the Council in the near future will be protests against the construction of a multifunctional residential complex in the historical center of the city - three 75 -meter towers. Residents of the district where construction is planned, believe that the towers will spoil the appearance of the old part of the city, and they fear that underground parking is dangerous for neighboring houses. The regional governor Andrei Vorobyov, even when he was a candidate, promised that there would be no “towers”, but the developers still received permission to implement the project.

The GUNS has already held a rally and even organized a “folk referendum”: they themselves bypassed. 2,300 ballots were handed over to the office of the governor, but the authorities did not react in any way.

“On the boulevard, people specially chose apartments for themselves, because it is beautiful there, in the same style of the house are built. Suddenly, instead of this quiet place there will be a shopping complex, trucks will ride, huge buildings, thousands of visitors, ”Fedor Karpov explains the essence of the problem.

“The old city was created by famous architects - just as the city of science, aviation, each house here has its own history. Each house has initiative groups that are ready to go out and create a Maidan here, if a construction begins, ”says individual entrepreneur Svetlana Bezlepkin, one of the most active members of the first GUNC.

Why power does not interfere

One of the defendants in the “Swamp business” Alexei Gaskarov was a deputy of both the CSU and the GU. In the Zhukovsky council, everyone is talking about him with great respect.

“Gaskarov said what was at the CSR meetings, which could be brought to our council. We took the CSO template, but we did not have interaction with them, as such, ”says Kirill Surin, editor of the Zhukovsky Vesti site.

Why, nevertheless, the Zhukovsky council works, and the coordination council of the opposition did not take root as an idea? The interlocutors of The New Times in the TIMS believe that the whole point is that people with different political views are difficult to work in structure with political goals, recall that almost a third of the CSR members encountered pressure and persecution by law enforcement agencies.

“Even in the CSO, there were periodically such stories: here, I didn’t like something, and I'm leaving. This should not be in normal parliament. You are convinced that you are right, and do not leave defiantly, like a capricious child, ”said Alexander Galas, a member of the Zhukovsky Council

On the TSA election website, the opinions of candidates about urban problems are posted. On most points, they practically coincide.
None of The New Times is tuning to maintain advice for decades. They say that if the local authorities were closer to the people, there would be no need for such a council.

“The goal that we set is not a struggle for power, but control of the authorities. So that the population feels that power was subordinate to him. But among our tasks - including the preparation of a personnel reserve for nomination to the Council of Deputies of the city, ”says Galas.

Members of the GUNS complain that the city administration does not like them, but so far they do not interfere with working. Perhaps because the council does not have obvious leaders, but to fight with everyone at once is too expensive.

The New Times applied for the commentary to the mayor of Zhukovsky, a member of the United Russia party Andrei Voytyuk. This is what he said: “It is difficult for me to evaluate their work. I get the impression that the GUNC works in order to advertise the GU itself. Public organizations should work for a construct, give real, specific offers, and not shake the air with slogans, engage in frantic criticism. I work with all the organizations of the city, but somehow it does not get better with the HSS. ”