Fewer children will rest in summer camps in 2008

Fewer Chisinau children will rest in summer camps this year. At the Chisinau Council’s meeting of May 15, Tatiana Nagnibeda-Tverdohleb, the head of the General Division of Education, Youth and Sports, said that the number of children that will go to summer camps is lower because the prices of the food and non-food products have increased and larger sums of money are needed to pay for the same products and services, Info-Prim Neo reports. The Chisinau Municipal Council has allocated 23 million lei for organizing the summer time of the children in 2008. The money will be used to purchase the necessary things and to repair the rooms where the children will stay, as well as to pay salaries to the Division’s employees that will work in summer camps. Tatiana Nagnibeda-Tverdohleb said that 5,400 children from Chisinau will be included in the list of beneficiaries this year. This is by 600 children fewer than last year. She said that the sums allocated for the summer camps this year are the same, but the expenses are higher. The Division has to invest more money in preparing the camps and cannot provide places for a larger number of children. The Division’s head also said that the children from socially-vulnerable families and from boarding schools will make up about 25% of the beneficiaries of tickets to summer camps. The parents will pay only 20% of the cost of the rest of the tickets. In another development, a number of local councilors expressed their disagreement and concern about the delay in presenting the draft decision about summer camps. Some of the councilors said that this endangers the organization of the summer camps and could disrupt the preparations. The AMN councilor Mihai Magdei said that in countries like Romania, Russia and Ukraine such projects are approved at the start of the year so as to manage to make the preparations in time. “We examine the decision on May 15. The children will go to the camps when the smell of paint will be still felt,” the councilor said. The councilors of the PCRM faction said that there is not much time left until the works should be completed. But Tatiana Nagnibeda-Tverdohleb replied that every year the Division manages to prepare the resorts and summer camps in due time. “As the money was already allotted, the preparations will be hastened,” she said. The PSD councilor Loreta Handrabura asked the Division to present a report on the costs of organizing the summer camps by the end of the summer.