A new issue was published in Klin

Officials explain their decision by the desire to bring order to street trading: to update the design of retail facilities and remove visiting traders with questionable goods, and instead give preferences to local producers with socially significant products.

However, as often happens, the words of officials differ greatly from their actions. MK conducted its own investigation and found out that the NTOs that are being torn down are those that have everything in order with both their documents and their design.

Black Monday

Klin-5 is a former military town, and now one of the microdistricts of a city near Moscow. There are no random people here, almost everyone knows each other: some served together, some had children who grew up side by side, went to the same kindergartens and schools.

There are still many retired military personnel living in the town – some of them are very distinguished people. So the news that they wanted to demolish the newspaper kiosk on Mayakovsky Street came as a bolt from the blue. Almost immediately a crowd of people began to gather around the trade pavilion – mostly elderly people and mothers with strollers.

“What are you doing? Where are you taking our kiosk?” the residents were indignant.

“Where are we going to buy fresh newspapers now?” the old people asked.

“We also bought coloring books, toys, and books for our children here,” the younger shoppers echoed.

Vera Stepanovna, who worked at this newspaper kiosk for almost 14 years, tells us about the events of "black" Monday. The woman has not yet recovered from the shock she experienced two days ago.

According to the kiosk owner, on the morning of June 9, two women from the local administration first approached her kiosk, then a young man joined them, the three waved their service IDs in front of her nose and demanded in an ultimatum that the seller pack up all the goods within 2 hours, vacating the pavilion, otherwise she would get into trouble.

Vera Stepanovna is not a timid person herself, she is a retired military man, she served in the army for 25 years. But there was something to be confused about here.

"How can I pack everything and take it away alone? After all, I have my own bosses, so talk to them," she told the officials. But they stood their ground: take the goods away or we'll take everything along with the kiosk, and then look for it wherever you want.

“I was so nervous that even my hands were shaking, but then our administrator came and helped me pack the products and load them into the car,” the woman recalls.

According to her, no one moved the kiosk on Monday, only the next day a crane was brought up and loaded onto a car, so why officials needed to put such harsh pressure on this elderly woman is completely unclear.

"I usually opened at 8 a.m., and at 8.15 a.m. there was already a line for newspapers. Over the years, I recognized all my customers by face; for most of them, going to the kiosk for a newspaper is a long-standing tradition, a daily morning ritual. How they will manage without it now, I have no idea," the seller laments.

Breaking is not building

Now residents of Klin-5 have to take public transport or walk several kilometers to get to the nearest newspaper kiosk; it is unlikely that any pensioner will be able to afford such morning trips for newspapers. And where is the guarantee that there will be any newspaper kiosks left in Klin? In the coming days, the local administration intends to dismantle 4 more NTOs, which belong to one of the largest distributors of printed publications in the Moscow region.

According to the director of the small enterprise "Gazeta" Alexey Efimov, the process of demolishing non-stationary trade pavilions in the Moscow region began actively last year. Officials justified their decision by saying that they want to remove outdated kiosks from the streets and replace them with modern trade facilities made in a single style.

Since the company where Alexey works distributes the most socially significant product – the press, the initiative of the Moscow Region officials was even received with enthusiasm. After all, distributing newspapers is not like selling shawarma. The small business decided to buy 200 new printing pavilions in Moscow so that the Moscow Region would be no worse than the capital.

"Last year we had 8 pavilions in Klin, for three of them our contract for the placement of non-stationary trade facilities was expiring, in addition, these facilities were really old, and we dismantled them without any arguments a year ago. But the officials had no complaints about the appearance of the remaining five newsstands, and the contract for these outlets is valid until the end of 2026. Therefore, when an order came from the Klin administration to demolish the remaining five kiosks, we filed a complaint with the Prosecutor General's Office and the Prosecutor's Office of the Moscow Region, since we consider these actions of officials illegal," says the head of the enterprise.

By the way, the residents of Klin-5 also agree with him; after the demolition of the local press kiosk, they complained to the governor of the Moscow region and the head of the Klin administration that they were left without fresh press.

But whether the regional government will hear this voice of the people, and most importantly, whether they will understand what potential voters are asking the authorities for, is a big question.

On June 9, when the newspaper kiosk was being demolished in Klin, the Government of the Moscow Region held another meeting on the issue of dismantling non-stationary trade facilities, during which it was decided that, although initially it was planned to dismantle about 2.5 thousand non-stationary trade facilities in 2025, now the figure of demolished stalls will be increased to 3.6 thousand.

Remember, the management of OOO Gazetta was initially required to demolish only 3 old pavilions, and promised to leave the other 5? But since plans changed at the top, at the local level, at the municipal level, they also had to be revised. Thus, the kiosk on Mayakovsky Street and 4 more in other parts of the city of Klin, which at the beginning of the year were satisfactory both in design and in other parameters, unexpectedly ended up on blacklists for demolition.

“We are being given a plan to dismantle the non-stationary trade facility from the region, no one wants to end up in the red zone, so we will demolish it…”, the Klin administration admitted on condition of anonymity.

Right to information

When this material was ready for printing, the editorial office of MK received a call from another city near Moscow – Vidnoye. Its residents complained that their city was also planning to demolish newspaper kiosks. At least one of them, located on Sovetskaya Street, Building 2B, had a corresponding announcement.

“How is this possible?” people said. “The governor of the Moscow region, Andrei Vorobyov, promised that only illegal stalls would be demolished, but those that operate in a civilized manner and sell the goods we need would not be touched.”

The editorial board of MK would also like to receive an answer to this question. Because retail outlets that sell fresh newspapers and are located within walking distance of residential areas are precisely about caring for people and paying attention to local business, which is what they like to talk about so much at meetings in the regional government. Because the owners of most non-profit organizations in the Moscow region are local entrepreneurs, the same small business that officials at all levels promise to develop, cherish and nurture, because it pays taxes to the local budget and provides jobs for its own, Moscow region, residents.

And finally. Although in conversations with officials we have heard more than once the assertion that no one now, except for old people, reads the press "on paper", and all normal people look for news on their smartphones, we categorically disagree with this.

The “paper” press is still in demand among Russian readers, including residents of the Moscow region, and, despite all the digital technologies, many people prefer to hold a fresh issue of the newspaper in their hands over a morning cup of tea or coffee, rather than stare at the screen of a smartphone.

Access to information is a fundamental right of every citizen of our country, and the total closure of newsstands deprives people of an alternative way to receive news. This is especially true for those areas where Internet coverage is weak and where the majority of the population does not own digital technologies.

Therefore, it is worth reminding the reformers from the regional government once again that press kiosks are not just points of sale, but important social facilities that provide equal access to information for all groups of the population.

Fortunately, Russian President Vladimir Putin agrees with us; it is not for nothing that he gave the Russian Government the order to develop a set of measures to support the press and develop street trade in printed publications.

We are waiting for these plans “from above” to finally be accepted for implementation at the local level in the Moscow region.