Zagreb city officials told a news conference on Tuesday that a harmful decision on a wastewater treatment facility, under which 400 million kuna of city budget funds was to have been invested in the project, would be annulled, as would a decision on the Blok Kvatric company favouring a private investor.

Mayor Tomislav Tomasevic said that the City Assembly would annul a decision on the financing of the tertiary treatment of wastewater so as to enable the city-owned Vodoopskrba i Odvodnja water utility company to be the investor instead of a private company and so that the investment, worth 400 million kuna, could be financed from EU funds instead of from the city budget.

“With that decision we will save 400 million kuna of city budget money,” Tomasevic said, adding that investing in the tertiary treatment of wastewater was a precondition for the city-owned Zagreb Holding multi-utility conglomerate to be able to draw from EU funds around 2 billion kuna for Vodoopskrba i Odvodnja in the next seven years.

Deputy Mayor Luka Korlaet said that a proposal to launch the liquidation of Blok Kvatrić d.o.o. would be submitted for inclusion on the agenda of this year’s first City Assembly session.

The case concerns a harmful decision by the city’s former ruling coalition, made up of the BM 365 party and the HDZ, from September 2020, whereby the city ceded management rights over city-owned land worth 155 million kuna to a private investor.

Deputy Mayor Danijela Dolenec said that a draft decision on proposals and petition campaigns would be put to public consultation to be held in the next 30 days.

Under the decision, an issue can be put on the agenda of the City Assembly if 10% of Zagreb’s voters collect signatures in support of such a move within a period of 90 days.

Under the current Referendum Act, the deadline for signature collection is 15 days and the new bill envisages 30 days for signature collection, she said.

Mayor Tomasevic also said that Renata Susa was appointed the new director of the Zagreb Trade Fair Centre.