Or about to be missed.
Recall some background on Russia’s military housing issue.
In 2012, President Vladimir Putin publicly set his latest deadlines for resolving the military’s housing problems: 2013 for permanent apartments and 2014 for service apartments. He just awarded himself an extra year on each. They had been 2012 and 2013. And 2012 and 2013 weren’t even his original deadlines.
When Sergey Shoygu came to the Defense Ministry last November, he faced at least 80,000 men, officers and former officers, in line for permanent apartments owed them on retirement.
The MOD says there were approximately 60,000 needing them at the beginning of 2013.
The Defense Ministry’s Chief of the Housing Support Department (DZhO or ДЖО) Sergey Pirogov has only been on the job about a month. Previously DZhO’s deputy chief, he replaced his boss — Galina Semina — a Serdyukov appointee.
Sergey Pirogov
On 1 October, Pirogov told the RF Public Chamber that 41,400 servicemen will receive permanent apartments in 2013. He claimed 16,200 already have this year, and 25,200 will receive them in November and December.
There is simply no way the MOD can put more than 25,000 in apartments during the balance of this year. Despite Pirogov’s statement, there is probably no one who believes him.
Pirogov has called permanent housing a continually “flowing” problem; 24,700 new men joined the line in 2012 and 9,900 this year.
The MOD grapples with its housing problem using two instruments — apartments in their “natural form” or generally despised GZhS, State Housing Certificates. It also hopes soon to make the One-Time Monetary Payment (YeDV or ЕДВ) a possibility.
If the Finance Ministry will agree on an amount, and the Duma approves some legislation this fall, the YeDV might start on 1 January. It would be figured on the cost of a square meter of housing, years served, and household size, and presumably won’t be less than 3 million rubles and military men hope it’s a lot, lot more.
In mid-September, Pirogov effectively admitted the military department came to the idea of the YeDV in order to get around the problem of massive corruption in military housing construction.
He also appeared on Ekho Moskvy’s Voyennyy sovet program, and said:
“It’s perfectly obvious that the one-time payment to receive apartments is needed to resolve the issue at once. Moreover, some universalism is necessary here, a universal mechanism should develop equal rights for all servicemen. In our opinion, an exit from the difficult situation could be the transition to presenting one-time monetary payments, to acquire or build housing for servicemen, the so-called YeDV. On what is this based? Well, look here, according to those figures which the MOD leadership has more than once voiced. Annually we are paying servicemen, at the disposition [of their commanding officers], a huge amount… We can’t dismiss a serviceman before providing him housing, and are forced to put him in so-called disposition, and in this case the serviceman receives [rank] pay, he can use sanitorium-resort support, other privileges, given to servicemen, but he can’t be dismissed from the armed forces if he doesn’t have housing. And in this instance, the MOD will spend up to 30 billion rubles a year supporting our servicemen. It’s bitter to have to say that the problem of providing housing is long-running enough, and a serviceman can be at the disposition 5 or more years. And here about that sum which I named, if we multiply it by a quantity of years, we get a simply enormous sum, which the MOD pays out fulfilling its obligations, this is the first conclusion. The second conclusion is the resources which the MOD actually spends on construction are also enormous. By any evaluation, it’s on the order of 30 billion rubles a year. But consider that on average it takes 2-2.5 years to build an apartment block, half a year goes to the necessity of drawing up documents. And it turns out that 3 years properly here this money is here, it’s hung up, it’s not realized so to say. Yes, they spent it, on building apartments, they so to say laid it out in such a way. But even the optimization of additional expenditures, particularly with apartment upkeep. I also would like to introduce an example, in 2012 we had more than 10 thousand frozen for various reasons, not occupied by servicemen. It’s natural so to say that these apartments require their upkeep. But in this case, if we didn’t turn off or didn’t turn on the heat properly, this in turn means correspondingly then already essential repair to newly-built, but not allocated apartments. And this sum here — it becomes in principle very large and very significant for the MOD. And more than this, even the colossal expended amounts, about which I already actually spoke, deciding the question with housing construction, we aren’t resolving the problem.”
Lots interesting here . . . Pirogov talks pretty clinically about those left “at the disposition,” but it’s a difficult life for an officer living in his garrison on a fourth of the pay he had when he had a duty post. And, Pirogov says, the situation goes on a long time and costs up to 30 billion rubles per year.
Pirogov says the MOD has also been spending 30 billion on housing construction, including on 10,000 unoccupied apartments. But construction hasn’t solved the housing dilemma.
Maybe the housing situation has improved somewhat, but, as Pirogov admits, it’s still a long way from solved. And Putin’s deadlines come and go and come again.
Russian Defense Policy 