After two years in office, the Mayor of Medgidia, Mr. Marian Iordache, talked with the ”Replica” newspaper reporters of the disastrous financial situation of the municipality he administers, about projects that are completed or under implementation, but also of future plans. Regarding the 2012 elections, Marian Iordache specified that has not yet decided whether run for election, as the difficulties he has encountered so far "do not urge me to continue this ordeal”. Liberal Marian Iordache is not 100% convinced that he will have a "strong support" from  the center administration, but only a "moderate support" from  the county administration.

Reporter: The situation in Medgidia looks, after more than two years in office, just as tense as in the campaign. What is actually happening?
Marian Iordache: From my point of view the situation seems to look as tense as in the campaign or at least the first months in office. At the beginning of term, because the lack of experience of my advisers and  myself, I had problems adapting to the reality from Medgidia and adapting to government legislation. The City Council has the vehemence of unsupported concrete things, in that they are vehement and  nothing else. Unlike election time, when the heat of events lead to very strong tensions in the meetings, in the City Council now there is only one objector, the former mayor, otherwise all the other counselors have more controlled reactions and  are more aware of what they communicate, especially that in Medgidia, unlike other cities, City Council meetings are televised and transmitted directly to the citizens.
Rep.: Why have you not managed to reach a consensus with the local elected of PDL? What do they really want?
M.I.: It is a revengeful attitude of the PDL. I was pretty forgiving, I have made several proposals to the PDL group, I tried to bring them to the table for discussions. This small group in Medgidia is limited around the former mayor and appears to be in an irreconcilable situation. If others were representatives of the PDL at this time I think it could have collaborated with the group of advisers, especially since both their interests and mine are to help the citizens and solve their problems. Unfortunately, the group that is now the PDL has one problem, that of revenge and regretful  they had  lost the previous elections. Major mistakes were made in the previous term, which they do not recognize as their own, and because of this, things don’t seem to return to normal. I don’t have a problem in the sense of me in the PDL group fighting in the City Council, especially since, as a minority group virtually all they make is noise and do not produce anything positive for the community, fact that is visible at each Local Council meeting. Sure, there were times when they had a good idea or corrected a decision, we have acknowledged that without any problems, I thanked them and told them that I agree with their proposals.
Rep.: Who forms this PDL group and what do they actually dispute?
M.I.: They do not have a specific theme to appeal. The group consists of the former Mayor, the former Deputy, Camelia Plesca which is very close to the former Mayor, and a counselor, that is a much more balanced and careful with administration.
Rep.: With all the madness, what have you achieved so far in Medgidia?
M.I.: A lot. I would say that most of the projects that I've set out to do we accomplished with great difficulty. There are two key issues in my work so far that have prevented me from doing a good job. I’m talking about the level of financial resources. Medgidia has a much smaller budget formed by collecting taxes, and a big part of  this budget goes to loans borrowed from banks. In the former mandate there have been  made about 500 billion ROL in debt, money that must be paid until 2028. The total amount that the municipality must pay to banks is 1040 billion ROL. It is an enormous amount and we would have to sacrifice10 years of our budget money in order to pay these loans. When I ran for the election I knew what I was getting into. In the previous mandate, as councilman, I had information on local revenues, but I never imagined that the situation will be so difficult. We found that the City Hall’s income had always been 120 billion ROL, but the former mayor said the municipality’s own revenues are 400 billion ROL. Giving the impression that City will easily be able to return the money, banks granted  loans with a grace period until August 2008. My advantage in this difficult situation is that the team that I work with has found solutions to attract European money. In this regard, we have 19 projects with European funding, through which we brought in Medgidia about 7 million Euros.
Q: What are the projects?
M.I: The most important project refers to the rehabilitation of the streets, in the sum of 5 million. Other two projects, worth 800.000 euros, cover the construction of 10 houses for Rroma youth, another project worth 600.000 euros envisages the rehabilitation of the sewage pumping station and we completed a bypass road with EU funding. We also have projects relating to public hygiene and improving the business environment. The one I wrote and am very proud of is a 5.5 million euro project that will change the face Medgidia in terms of town planning layout.
Rep.: You say you found a difficult financial situation at the City Hall of Medgidia. What happened with the money contracted from banks by the former administration?
M.I.: They paved 7 kilometers of municipal roads, with a credit of approximately 20 million RON. By comparison I paved 21 kilometers of streets and sidewalks with only 10 million RON, while the former mayor has spent 20 million RON. Practically he consumed with one-third more than us. The works were executed with an in-house firm. Also, they have spent 30 million for the rehabilitation of old power plants, an  action that has not been completed, they bought power plants without making the proper network for distribution, they bought a cogeneration aggregate worth 2 million RON that cannot be used by anyone, and they installed PVC windows for schools for 2.1 million RON. We asked the court to analyze these things and research is being made.
Rep.: Has it come to accounts being blocked? What is the financial situation of the City Hall of Medgidia?
M.I: We record debts of around 8 million RON. Currently we are collecting revenues at a rate of approximately 76% for the current year. The largest gap recorded is on the heating subsidy, in amount of 2.3 million that the state budget had to allocate to local administration which in turn would have had to pay for gas. Without this payment we cannot provide heating to the city. It will not come to accounts being blocked. The situation  is very difficult. The city’s money has to be spent with great wisdom. During the former mandate about 1 million RON has been spent for gates, doors and schools to be painted orange. I have not proposed to change these colors because we have no one to blame, except those who did this nonsense. And they have been punished by the citizens, which didn’t give them their votes when they realized they were being fooled.
Q: At the present, what future projects do you have for Medgidia?
M.I: The most important project would be the Integrated Urban Development Plan through which a ring road will be constructed, the parks in the city will be remade, we will equip all taxi stations with cabins and mount video cameras on public domain. We are talking about a complex project which seeks to improve management in the North Western and Central parts of Medgidia. Another project concerns the rehabilitation of the wastewater treatment plant, the networks and pumping stations, worth 6.3 million euro, project will be implemented in collaboration with RAJA Constanta. Medgidia, although a community with big social problems, with a large number of citizens with low resources, is not related to social infrastructure. We will create a master plan ing terms of addressing environmental and social themes in each area to identify problems and solutions so that this master plan will be able to get us funding from the European Union, for the Rroma or Turkish community, people with large families, with no jobs, training or school, to help them change their standard of living, that now is at a subsistence level. We envisage the use of local resources. An important resource in Medgidia is agriculture, especially wines. I thought a project called "Wine Road". The project is not invented, but seeing that all roads in Romania about winemaking or wine production end at the Danube, we thought that together with the City Halls of Murfatlar and Cernavoda we will renew this tradition of Dobrogea wine in order to develop the production capacity of grapes and  in this way create jobs.
Q: Will you run for another mandate as mayor?
Marian Iordache: I have not decided yet. The situation so far doesn’t make me want to continue this ordeal, because being a mayor at Medgidia, unlike many other places, is really difficult. It is a calamity to be mayor in a city where there are no resources and, on top of that, there happens to be a hostile government, problems in terms of finances, and also have debts to banks. At the same time, although I have support from the PNL group in Medgidia, I don’t have strong support from the national level, but I have a moderate support at county level. Maybe it's my fault because I am less political involved and  more focused on administrative matters. If I feel the support of my colleagues at the county and national level, perhaps I'll run for election.
Q: Are you afraid of certain people who might become your counter candidate?
Marian Iordache: I'll say with great confidence that at this moment I have the most experience in local government. I was 13 years deputy mayor, four years I was a councilman and now I am Mayor. I have a total of 19 years working in local government. In Medgidia I know almost everyone, I know almost all problems, I even know the position of all ducts, sewage covers, facilities, schools, I’ve been in the basements of all the schools, and in the attic of the City Hall or any other public building, I know about Medgidia far more than any rival of mine. It is not enough to know, you should know what to do and  have the resources with which to do it. I am trying to create these resources and I hope to achieve this. One method was the outsourcing. It costs me less to work with companies that already worked with public services, I can be available more time at work, I use less financial resources and at the same time the problem that used to be solved as mayor is being solved by a specialized company. I had to know every day when pipes burst, when the teams react, when we are buying electrodes, but for about a year since RAJA is dealing with these services, I am relieved of the problem of water supply and sewerage works and things are going better and better.

Author: Alexandra Vasile Source: Replica de Constanta

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