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St Peterburg Times, August 27, 2004

Being 'European' Demands New Type of Attitude

By Vladimir Kovalev
This summer I have noticed a very positive development in the city that at first glance could be taken as a sign that St. Petersburg is getting close to matching the European standards that Governor Valentina Matviyenko has alluded to as the goal of her administration.

Surprisingly enough, a clean up of dirty yards in the city center has started. This year City Hall plans to spend 300 million rubles ($10.3 million) to put in order 10 yards on Nevsky Prospekt and clean up and paint 46 buildings on the city's main thoroughfare.

I have also noticed quite a lot of work being done in some yards on Gorokhovaya Ulitsa, one of the dirtiest areas in the heart of St. Petersburg close to Sennaya Ploshchad. And even half of the yard of the apartment where I live near Ploshchad Truda, which looked as if it had been abandoned for future generations to deal with, suddenly received a new layer of asphalt one day this month.

Even though, it covers only a half the yard, this is better than nothing.

That's what I thought until I saw a huge pile of excrement between the first and second floors of my staircase, which was obviously left by a construction worker who had been paid from the city budget to ennoble my living area. Good job.

It would be hard to imagine seeing the same thing on the staircase of a residential building in some European city, such as Vienna, London or Prague. My imagination might be bad, but it couldn't go that far.

A couple of weeks later, European standards seemed to have moved even farther away in my mind after I became a victim of a booby trap left by some dog right by the entrance to the staircase. Only a puddle, that appeared early morning in one of the numerous holes in newly laid asphalt, saved my shoe.

Unfortunately, the presence of such booby traps is one of the key indications how far St. Petersburg and its residents are from the state Matviyenko wants the city to be in.

More than three years have passed since the Legislative Assembly took action to force dog owners to equip themselves with small shovels and paper bags to clean up their pets' droppings. The idea died shortly after it was introduced as a bill in 2001, because legislators had no right to pass more or less sensible fines on this matter, according to the old federal Administrative Code that was still in force that year.

The new code says nothing that suggests the hands of officials are tied on such a matter.

This year, City Hall together with the local veterinary service is about to make another move. At the end of October, the Legislative Assembly expects to receive from City Hall a bill on keeping and protecting pets in St. Petersburg that introduces some rules and fines for people who like their dogs more than other citizens.

It is not clear why, but the authorities are cagey about announcing the exact size of the planned fines. Though Legislative Assembly officials are quite skeptical about discussing possible fines, the main question will be whether the police will bother to tackle such minor violations as fouling the sidewalk.

"Just try to imagine a policeman trying to get a fine from a Caucasian sheepdog," Yabloko member Boris Vishnevsky said. "Would he be brave enough to demand money while standing close to a creature that is ready to eat him?"

"It would be possible if it was a poodle of some sort, but I don't think it would work in general," he added. "You won't assign a policeman to follow each dog in the city."

Vishnevsky has a dog himself, so maybe this is the reason for his skepticism. I don't have one, so the only conclusion I have looking at the city's pavements and yards is that the city parliament should pass a law that would introduce very high fines for dog owners who ignore the interests of their neighbors. Maybe this would also be the way to influence the development of the civility for some construction workers who put themselves on the same level as pets.

 

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St Peterburg Times, August 27, 2004

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