In Sochi, courts bring Sobolevka village on brink of ecological disaster by legalizing unsanctioned buildings

The conflict between Vice-Mayor of Sochi Evgeny Gorlov and residents of the village of Sobolevka has arisen from the demands of the Mayor's Office to connect new buildings to the sewerage system with the help of a private contractor and the unreasonable price of 1 million roubles for the connection. This was reported by local residents.

Multi-storey apartment houses which had been built without permissions were legalized by the courts' decisions. The new buildings were connected to the local sewage treatment plants (STPs), which are not able to cope with large volumes of wastewater. This was declared by the Sochi Vice-Mayor. Residents of the village of Sobolevka, who are not directly involved in the conflict, demand to solve the problem with the connection of the new buildings to the centralized sewerage system.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that on June 6, Evgeny Gorlov, the Vice-Mayor of Sochi, was hospitalized with brain concussion. The Vice-Mayor has reported that he was attacked by a local resident. According to the city administration, the incident occurred when Evgeny Gorlov as a member of the commission verified the connection of the houses in the village of Sobolevka to the centralized sewerage system. The police assume that the official was attacked by Viktor Belevsky, a resident of the city of Yessentuki. However, the suspect denies his involvement in the incident.

The village is covered by the bad smell of wastewater brought by the Vereschaginsky Creek to the beach of the "Zhemchuzhina" (Pearl) Hotel located in the centre of Sochi. This was reported by Nikolai Sergienko, a local resident, a retired builder. According to him, the problem of wastewater became even more urgent since 2010.

In September 2014, the city residents organized a gathering. Participants of the gathering claimed that Sochi faces a life-threatening health-threatening environmental situation: the sewerage system in the city fails to operate; as a result, wastewater flows into the Black Sea and reaches the city beaches

Full text of the article is available on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’.