ANNUAL MEETING WITH THE MAYOR OF DRYANOVO, MIROSLAV SEMOV 16/01/2019

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Here are the jumbled notes I took from this morning's meeting with the village and municipality mayors.  Guaranteed to be in a random order, nonsensical and full of glaring falsehoods.

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Miroslav opened the meeting by saying he would give a summary of where the budget went last year and plans for expenditure this year.  He would then open the meeting up to any suggestions from the floor. He added that most of the issues raised at last year's meeting had been successfully dealt with.

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Each year places with the worst infrastructure issues are dealt with, but that not every village would necessarily be on the list each year.  In Gostilitsa work has been done on improving the cemetary, park, children's play area.  In Dryanovo there was EU funding for resurfacing of certan streets which will continue this coming year.

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There are elections this year: In May for something to do with the EU, and in September/October the mayor and town councillors.  Because Gostilitsa's registered population is now less than 300 we won't be able to vote for a mayor. Instead, a person will be appointed by Dryanovo.  We will still vote for the Dryanovo mayor and councillors (if eligible to vote).

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Nadya then said a little about planned work in Gostilitsa.  There are to be three street repair projects, one at a crossroads somewhere, one up by the top fountains and another somewhere up behind the post office building.  She reminded people to keep the front of their property tidy and to remove any branches from the road areas as when it snows it's making it difficult for the snow ploughs to work effectively.

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The meeting was now opened up for local discussion.

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On the topic of snow ploughs, one person suggested we need access to a smaller one which is able to get to some of the narrower streets. The other larger ones are organised by the municipality and come from Tryavna. The same person seemed to be complaining that the ploughs don't get to Gostilitsa till the afternoon.

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The issue of not enough dustbins came up and a villager suggested that one of the big containers which doesn't hardly get used, be moved to an area where more are needed. This seemed to be viable as the councillor responsible for waste said that they only had a limited bidget for providing more bins, which was shared between all the villages.  This councillor also said we need to stop putting things like soil, green waste and rubble in the bins as not only can it end up damaging them but that the council get charged more for such waste when it arrives at the depot in Sevlievo.  Apparently the cost of waste disposal from Gostilitsa adds up to more than what we pay in total for our municipality tax. I asked if there was somewhere you can dispose of building waste yourself and apparently you can take it direct to the Sevlievo depot free of charge (just show your lichna card).  Nadya said there is also a place in Gostilitsa specifically for green waste and she will show me where it is, though she complained that people are dumping plastics in that spot.  Someone reported that the big bin near them is regularly rumaged through by gypsies who then throw the rubbish everywhere as they are sorting through it.  Moroslav said if you see anyone dumping anything illegally then photograph them and there's a link on the Dryanovo website where you can send the photo with details so the offenders can be prosecuted.

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Someone mentioned about the quarry road between Skalsko and Gabrovo, and whilst he realised it wasn't a municipality issue, couldn't something be done to force the quarry owners to take better care of the roads.  Miroslav said that this has regularly been reported to the national roads agency as they are the ones who need to take it up.

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Another road issue was the damag caused by the logging trucks.  One man said it was because they were now using very heavy 15 ton lorry loads which did more damage. Since there was no alternative route for the lorries to take, couldn't the firms be asked to use lighter lorries to bring the wood down and then load up a bigger one once back on a proper road.  The same guy said he'd tried having a word with the logging people but they were quite aggressive with him.

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Finally a woman mentioned that the school bus wasn't working this week but a councillor said that was already being dealt with.  Apparently it has to go to Pleven for repairs as that's part of the warrently deal, and that it would soon be fixed.

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ELECTRICITY CUTS

Service may be interrupted between 8.30am and 5pm on 8th/9th July whilst maintenance work is completed.

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