vlad.tribnet.com / Issue #564 / Social life / Reading article...

“I won’t work selling cabbage in the outdoor market,” says 27-year-old Marina, an idle mother of a four-year-old child, to surveillance inspectors during a recent raid aimed at monitoring problem families in Vladivostok.

Marina, a resident of the city’s Pervomaisky district, lives with her spouse who is also unemployed, and her disabled father. The four-member family lives on the father’s pension, most of which is used to pay kindergarten costs. The family has not paid rent or utility bills for several years.

Taking her son to kindergarten and then having booze with her friends at home seems to be a typical start to Marina’s day. The raid inspectors gave a final warning to Marina to find a job in a month’s time.

The raid, held late March by policemen together with surveillance commissions and inspectors from the Commission for Juveniles, is targeted not only at monitoring families but also at providing social aid when needed. Inspectors give recommendations on how to draw up any required documents, and also give warnings concerning the legal and administrative repercussions if adults do not perform their parental duties.

Marina’s next door neighbor was once deprived of her parental rights, which were later restored, and she now again takes care of her two children.

“Restoring parental rights is a very difficult procedure,’ reveals Olga Golubkova, Vice Head of the Juvenile Office of the city’s Pervomaisky Inner Affairs Department. According to her, not many parents wish to do this.

In Vladivostok’s Leninsky district, about 180 troubled families are on the inspectors’ check list. Among them is a family consisting of a woman and her three children, illegally living in a flat which belongs to the municipality. The family may be evicted soon due to a court’s decision. In the flat the inspectors found a 19-year-old girl with her little baby and two under-aged sisters. The living conditions were somewhat shocking, with a desk, a mattress and a pile of clothing in the corner of the room.

“Their mother does not have any rights for the apartment. The only thing we can do at the moment is to take the children to a rehabilitation center until their mother finds accommodation,” Natalia Kondrashova, an official for Leninsky’s Juvenile Comission said.