Odesa City Council is offered a loan of UAH 623 million

The Commission on Planning, Budget and Finance has agreed to submit a loan of UAH 623 million for consideration by the Parliament.

As it became known during the commission's meeting on August 25, the Ministry of Finance approved the loan and the list of objects to be financed with this money.

However, during the meeting, MP Volodymyr Kornienko emphasized that the deputies had not yet received the draft decisions on taking this loan and were not familiar with the list of objects to be financed. In general, the deputy emphasized that MPs receive information about the loan mostly from the media, although they should have received it from the Department of Finance before the session. The MP also questioned whether it was time to borrow in wartime.

Oleksiy Potapsky, the chairman of the commission, replied that the commission had not met until there was an order from the Ministry of Finance, so the documents had not been prepared. We are talking about 70 objects.

"Today we will prepare all the information required by the procedure and provide it to the MPs," he promised.

The deputy also emphasized that due to the inclusion of Odesa in the list of cities where military operations are taking place, the budget will lose more than 200 million hryvnias in addition to the 1.5 billion that the city lost because the personal income tax on military personnel now goes to Kyiv instead of remaining in the city's treasury.

Oleksiy Potapsky noted that they are currently planning to take out a loan at 16%, which is a standard interest rate. They are also taking it for political reasons to save the local budget balances from being withdrawn to the state budget.

As for the timing of the borrowing, the city council has more than 1 billion hryvnias on its accounts that it cannot use because of wartime. According to the chairman of the commission, these are healthcare, education, social protection, road maintenance, civil defense, and housing and communal services - repair of the sewer and bank protection, replacement of pumping equipment, elevators, and installation of cogeneration units.

Earlier, a number of media outlets reported that the city council was planning to take out this loan, but the Ministry of Finance rejected the application. Later, the Dumskaya newspaper reported that the Ministry had changed its mind.

Кирило Бойко