Chisinau Mayor urges strict observance of regulations banning slot machines from residential areas

Chisinau Mayor Dorin Chirtoaca urged the Trade and Public Food Division to strictly observe the regulations banning slot machines from residential areas and bust stops, Info-Prim Neo reports. Dorin Chirtoaca stated at a City Hall meeting on Monday that the regulations must be implemented without deviations until courts decide to cancel the ban at the request of gambling machines’ owners. But even if that happens, the Mayor says, the municipality will be looking for solutions to reinforce restrictions on this kind of activity in the city. The head of the Trade and Public Food Division, Vladimir Nirca, mentioned that the division has received multiple complaints from the members of the Association of gambling machines’ owners and some economic entities, asking to cancel the restrictions on placement of small-scale arcades along the main streets in the city. Earlier, Alexandru Tanase, leader of the City Council’s Liberal-Democratic group, has said the entrepreneurs involved in the gambling business ignore the ban on placing slot machines in residential areas and within a 100 metre range from bus stops, violating at the same time the 9 PM curfew at outdoor gambling facilities. However, Valeri Klimenko, councilmen of Ravnopravie (Equity) Movement, stated that even if he is against gambling, the ban was a wrong move, at least because cigarettes and alcohol are also tempting for some teenagers, but nobody banned them. Klimenko thinks that the restrictions on gambling machines will eventually kill this business in the city, which is not fair to those who invested huge sums in it.