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Putin's man in Siberia urges reform to lessen dependence on state budget
RIA Novosti

Novosibirsk, 14 May: The most important task of local government reform is to enable local authorities themselves to find sources of finance for the population's social needs and to expand the tax base. President Putin's representative plenipotentiary in the Siberian Federal District [SFD] Leonid Drachevskiy said this during his working meeting with members of the Great Khural [parliament] of the Republic of Tyva, representatives of the republic's executive bodies and heads of the territorial branches of federal departments.

"We should devolve to the local level not only the power to spend money but also to earn it. If we keep municipal bodies living off the [federal] budget, we'll never get moving on this problem," Drachevskiy said.

The meeting mainly discussed problems involved in the implementation of the federal law "On the general principles of organizing local government in the Russian Federation", the SFD information centre Siberia has reported.

According to Vasiliy Oyun, the chairman of the legislative chamber of the Great Khural of the Republic of Tyva, "the legislative and executive power and all the population of the Republic of Tyva are faced with the tough challenge set by the leadership of the state which calls for well-balanced collective decisions".

In particular, the serious problems of demarcating the territorial administrative borders and delimiting the property await solution, Vasiliy Oyun said.

The republic's lawmakers have to pass about 40 new laws and amend about 20 regulations, Oyun said.

During their meeting with the presidential representative, the legislators touched on a number of difficulties involved in the application of the new federal law in Tyva. For instance, it will be difficult to apply the new standards of administrative territorial division in the republic's kozhuuns [districts] with many municipalities where residents are few and far between. Also acute is the problem of translating the text of the law into the Tyvan language.

It has been decided to set up a republican commission to remove the bottlenecks. The presidential representative suggested that the head of the republic's government Sherig-oolu Oorzhaku should head the commission.

Drachevskiy also accepted the proposal to set up a centre to steer the implementation of the law "On the general principles of organizing local government in the Russian Federation" across the Siberian Federal District. The idea was suggested by Anatoliy Damba-Khuurak who heads the committee for state development and local government in the Great Khural's legislative chamber.