A village with 12 mayors

Bahrinesti village in Floresti district is also called “the village with 12 mayors”. The name comes from the fact that every month one of the villagers voluntarily takes on the mayor job. He/she walks from house to house and talks to people about their problems and necessities, reports Info-Prim Neo. Bahrinesti's elected mayor Feodosia Bunescu told a public debate that the voluntary mayors also have the informational bulletin on them, in which local authorities report the expenses from public money. The bulletin comes in both hardcopy and electronic formats. It has information on the activity of the Mayor’s Office, and other useful information for the resident. “At the end of each month a citizen is voluntarily summoned to an audience with the Mayor, discussed each problem, and then goes from household to household and talks about the bulletin reports. It is called “experience – the village with 12 mayors”, the volunteers go to elderly people, who cannot read and cannot come to the Mayor’s Office, talk to them, and afterwards report the discussions to the mayor, stating the problem and, thus, keeping the Mayor’s agenda busy”, said Feodosia Bunescu. A paralegal has been working in the locality for three years, providing the villagers access to juridical information. This is a person who, albeit not a lawyer, can offer confidential counseling on different subjects to people who request it. Feodosia Bunescu talked to other Mayors from the Floresti district. She asked them whether they would also like to have a paralegal. “Initially all of them said that it would be a good idea, that it would be easier for them, but when she sent them the form they were supposed to fill-in and argument their need for such an employee, no one applied”, said the Mayor. There are almost 900 households in Bahrinesti. Half of them are connected to the internet. The village also has a Wi-Fi network, which grants internet access to the village hall, the kindergarten, the ambulatory center, the church yard, and other local institutions. An information center is planned to be launched in the village’s culture hall, which will have e-books and internet access available to everyone. “For me, offering access to information means communicating with the masses. It means everything to an elective official”, the Bahrinesti Mayor pointed out. The information was communicated during the “The right to know – the right to live at home as they live in Europe”, organized by the “Acces-Info” Center, with the support of the German Foundation Hanns Seidel as part of the “European integration as a national idea with the potential of strengthening the Moldovan society” Project.