The budget of the Sverdlovsk region will have to spend the next funds on the water intake treatment facilities launched about a year ago in the city of Revda.
The arbitration court satisfied the requirements of the Regional Vodokanal, which insisted on the allocation of additional funding that was not originally included in the state contract. The company managed to prove that an investment agreement was signed with it, suggesting a possible increase in the cost of the facility, which was built for more than ten years with the accompanying changes in contractors and estimates. Since the municipality does not have free 150 million at its disposal, funds for obligations will be sought in the region, which was previously agreed upon by the government. Meanwhile, participants in the construction market note that, unlike Vodokanal of the Sverdlovsk region, in the contract with which the relevant opportunities were laid down, other players are in a much more difficult situation – firm contracts have been signed with them, which can rise in price by only 10%. In the current economic situation, the growth in value in some cases is a multiple. Speaking about risks, analysts, in particular, mention the billion-dollar project in Berezovsky, the implementation of which was planned to be extended until 2024. Municipalities already have a practice of refusing major work in housing and communal services.
The 17th Arbitration Court of Appeal upheld the complaint of JSC Water Supply and Sewerage Enterprise of the Sverdlovsk Region (Oblvodokanal, 100% owner – region) against the decision of the first instance, which refused to pay him more than 148 million rubles. The state-owned company insisted that UMP “Vodokanal” of the city of Revda underpaid her funds for the creation of water intake treatment facilities.
Treatment plants in Revda
To clarify, the editors previously talked about a ten-year construction project, for which more than 1.4 billion rubles were allocated from the regional and local budgets. The facility was put into operation in the spring of 2021. Then “Oblvodokanal”, acting as the general contractor, said that he had invested much more in the project than he was paid in the end. The deputies of the Legislative Assembly of the Sverdlovsk region, in turn, noted that at the conciliation commission it was decided that in the event of a positive court decision, money from the regional budget would be allocated by the administration of Revda. However, the arbitration initially came to the conclusion that the contractor is not entitled to demand money in excess of the amount prescribed in the contract.
As part of the re-examination of the case, Oblvodokanal proved that an investment contract was signed with it, in which the concepts of “additional costs” and “costs” for the project implementation are clearly separated. Moreover, the final amount of funds was not fixed in the contract of 2011, and the need for preliminary approval of investment costs was not prescribed. As a result, the appeal concluded that the requested amount “is not the plaintiff’s own expenses related to the performance of the functions of the customer’s service, but funds directly aimed at achieving the goal of the investment project.”
Moreover, it has been proven that the design documentation that passed the state examination assumed an estimated cost of 1.662 billion rubles. The total amount, according to “Oblvodokanal”, amounted to 1.584 billion rubles. It is up to this level that the court will increase the amount of payments made by Revda Vodokanal to the direct contractor.
Analyzing this dispute, the participants of the municipal and construction market draw attention to the fact that in the current economic situation, all investment projects will increase significantly in price. “We are talking about increasing the price tag from 30% up to several times. Depends on the volume, complexity of work and timing of implementation. Some projects incorporate Western technologies. The same Revda worked with the Hungarians, ”says the editorial interlocutor.
As a project, the implementation of which may face the corresponding risks, the interlocutors name the process of reconstruction of the sewage treatment facilities of the Municipal Unitary Enterprise BVKH Vodokanal in the city of Berezovsky, launched in 2021. It is planned to upgrade the mechanical cleaning building, the equalizer, the blower station, the mechanical dehydration building, the ultraviolet disinfection building and other production facilities. The facility was to be commissioned by the end of 2024. LLC “City Building”, the general director of which is the deputy of the Yekaterinburg City Duma Vitaly Chachin, planned to receive 940 million rubles for the work. The editors sent a request to the head of the contractor regarding the potential increase in the cost of work and the availability of equipment and materials for its implementation, but at the time of publication of the material there was no response.
Experts in the field of housing and communal services, meanwhile, believe that the contractor at the moment is unlikely to have managed to purchase the necessary, since in the first two years of work, the municipal authorities agreed on funding limits at the level of only 197 million rubles. “Fixed assets of 760 million are planned only for 2024. It is unlikely that the company will invest in equipment 2-3 years before the prospective deadline for receiving money, ”says the source of the publication, not excluding that in the future we can talk about concluding additional contracts for the implementation of this project, because within the framework of the fixed price of the municipal contract for reconstruction to significantly increase the price tag is impossible. So far, about 24 million rubles have been spent on the Berezovsky project.
It is worth recalling that throughout 2021, City Building sought the termination of the municipal contract with the authorities of Krasnoturinsk. Back in 2020, the contractor undertook to complete the construction of the pipeline from the Severopeschanskoye groundwater field. The company expected to receive 380 million rubles, but after a detailed study of the state of the long-term construction, the construction of which was originally carried out by the Yava-Stroy company, demanded that the agreement be terminated unilaterally.
The Krasnoturyinsky MKU “Department of Capital Construction” tried to force the company to continue working through the court, but representatives of the “City Building” insisted on refusing to cooperate. The main argument was the estimate documentation, which did not correspond to the design and actual state of the object. It was compiled in prices as of the 3rd quarter of 2015. In addition, it contained work that had already been completed at the site by the previous contractor. Meanwhile, a preliminary survey showed the need to perform additional work for more than 60 million rubles.
Photo by the Berezovsky administration
The municipality was ready to increase the cost of the contract, but the contractor refused to bear warranty obligations without delimiting the work performed by the first contractor as part of the then federal project for the development of TASED.
