In recent years, Riga City Council has been allocating more and more money for street repairs. Last year, the municipality allocated more than €35 million for road reconstruction this year.
In January, when the municipality presented this year's budget, the amount was slightly lower. Mayor Vilnis Ķirsis of New Unity told reporters at the time that the presentation showed €34.6 million. Back at the end of May, the head of the council's Traffic and Transport Committee, Olafs Pulks of New Unity, said that "we have €35 million of such repairs planned, that the asphalt is being laid completely new".
Last week, when the municipality announced this year's street repairs, it mentioned, among other things, that it would spend €30 million on them, stressing that this is the biggest investment ever. It is true: this year, the municipality will allocate 15 times more money to roads than in 2017 and 2018 combined.
But why has the amount promised for street repairs suddenly dropped by almost €5 million, or 15%? The capital's management is in no hurry to explain, delegating for an interview the head of the External Communication Department, Mārtiņš Vilemsons, who explained that the municipality has signed more favorable contracts than expected.
The next day, Mayor Vilnis Ķirsis rushed to comment on the ambitious savings on Latvian Radio.
The municipality has managed to save money on major street resurfacing works, such as the renovation of Kārļa Ulmaņa Avenue, the mayor said.
"It is very, very good that savings have been made. I talked to my colleagues from the [Latvian] Association of Large Cities, they also pointed out that this year, when they opened the procurement, they saw better prices. It's just that the market situation is [such] that [there is] sharper competition," said Ķirsis.
This year, Riga is preparing to renew almost 40 asphalted streets covering more than 630,000 square meters. Some of this is work planned last year that the municipality did not carry out. In addition, the municipality is going to renovate 90 gravel streets. This will be the most extensive street renovation in the capital for at least the last few years.
The remaining almost €5 million will be invested in other streets.
Asked whether the citizens of Riga can expect more streets to be renovated than the 128 planned for this year, Ķirsis said: "I can't promise that yet, but we will try to see, because time is quite short, what we can still manage to do before the end of the construction season."
Asked when the money would be reallocated, he said that "in any case, it is already borrowed money. It's not as if it's sitting there and we're moving it somewhere. It's just that if we have bought the same amount as we planned, cheaper, then we are simply borrowing less from the Treasury. Probably sometime in August, September [we will reallocate the money], then we will know."
The Riga Neighbourhood Alliance welcomes the municipality's ambitious savings, believing that most of the remaining almost five million euros should be spent on renovating pavements.The Alliance believes that the municipality should have congratulated itself on its achievement. Krista Asmusa, a lawyer at the Society for Openness - Delna, thinks similarly.
"This case is an example of how, frankly speaking, to undermine public trust a little by not communicating enough, by not communicating effectively, because the seemingly positive event - almost 15% savings on street renewal costs, now has a shadow of doubt over [it]," Asmusa said.
"But it is very likely that there has simply been a communication error, perhaps the council has not somehow internally coordinated how this message will be conveyed to the public. There is no reason to suspect anything else there, very probably. But from the public's point of view, of course, it looks different. Questions immediately arise," Asmusa said.
A year ago, the municipality predicted that next year the capital would allocate even more money for street repairs - at least €45 million.
At the time, the City Council leadership said that to keep the streets in good condition in Riga, such an amount would have to be allocated to street maintenance for several years in a row.
