Epress.am News from Armenia
The Vanadzor City Hall has been sending notices to citizens informing them that they owe ten-years’ worth of waste collection and disposal fees to the city. The city authorities also warn the citizens that they will be charged interest on the overdue fees if they do not begin paying them off. Speaking to Epress.am, a group of Vanadzor citizens, in turn, insisted that they have not been paying the money since “the trash does not get collected anyway.”
Vanadzor resident Ani Dolmazyan’s family, in particular, was notified that they owed fees for the years 2009-2012. “It was initially written that we owed 25 thousand drams. My parents went to the City Hall, and after some recalculations, 9 thousand were deducted from the original sum, and they had to pay the remaining 16 thousand. They have given the people a deadline and said they would begin charging interest if the payments are not made. But that must be illegal! Sixteen thousand is not a small amount of money for Vanadzor citizens because they are paid miserly salaries,” Dolmazyan told Epress.am.
Arayik Papikyan, a Vanadzor-based lawyer, for his part, argued that according to Armenia’s Tax Code, the claim has a 3-year limitation period. “Which means that no additional fines or interests can be levied against the citizens,” Papikyan added.
It is worth noting that these payment obligations were imposed on the citizens in circumstances where the city’s Council of Elders, which was elected on October 2, 2016, did not hold any meetings for 5 months. The Council’s first meeting was conduced only in late March.
When contacted by Epress.am for comment, however, a spokesperson for the Vanadzor City Hall said a it was not imperative that the Council of Elders issue a decision in relation to collecting payments; “The Council only sets the amount of money that has to be paid for garbage disposal; the collection process, meanwhile, is organized by the corresponding department of the municipality.”
According to the Armenian law on waste management, the municipality official continued, “citizens whould be held responsible for not paying the garbage disposal bills.”
Note, the afore-mentioned law also establishes responsibility for improper waste management by operators. “According to the procedure established by law, the operator is responsible for non-fulfillment or improper performance of its obligations and has to pay a fine to the community budget. The payment of the fine does not release the operator from performing its unfulfilled or improperly performed obligations,” the law says.
Nevertheless, no fines have been imposed against the waste management operator in Vanadzor.