Lukáš Blažej Chorovský, Ústí nad Labem-město

Main topics

01

Ústí to survive in

It might seem that the desulphurisation of power plants made Ústí's environmental problems disappear. But the statistics are relentless – according to ČSÚ data, a child born in Ústí nad Labem today will die more than three years earlier than, for example, a child from Prague. Multiplied by the number of residents, Ústí as a whole loses 272,600 years of life, and that's a serious reason to start tackling the problem. The city must lead by example – insulate buildings, use electric vehicles, remove old environmental burdens. Twenty-year-old diesels must not smoke in traffic jams under residents' windows every day. The city has the option of taking part in permitting procedures (EIA, granting exemptions), which it doesn't use. Greenery has an insulating function, but it's disappearing from Ústí – maintenance needs to be centralised, a care plan created and replacement planting carried out.

02

Ústí to live in

If you ask secondary school students how many of them want to stay in Ústí, two hands go up from the whole class. Ústí loses residents every year, and according to demographic studies this trend will keep getting worse. There's no single step that will make Ústí an attractive city to live in. What's needed are dozens of smaller measures – one person responsible for property maintenance (instead of passing the buck between the districts and the city authority), more municipal police officers, spatial planning that takes all groups of residents into account (just try getting across the lock with a pram, or from Krásňák to Střekov), outreach social work, a transparent city office, setting up municipal technical services, rules for advertising in public space and many, many more.

03

Ústí to experience

Ústí isn't dead, but compared with other regional cities it has some catching up to do. Tourists can't find their way around, many important landmarks aren't marked at all, and, for example, the detour around the closure of the main cycle path was only created when foreign cyclists were getting lost among cars on the main roads. The riverside along the Elbe and the Bílina consists mostly of concrete barriers. Milada remains forgotten. Mírové náměstí with the Díra is a disgrace to the city. School sports grounds aren't open to the public. The public transport pass is among the most expensive, even though frequency is low and connections aren't coordinated. Cultural institutions lack funding (for example, the Kult festival was almost cancelled), and the practice of organising their own cultural events differs radically between districts. All of this can be changed; it just takes the will.

A few words about me

I'm a lawyer and work as director of the organisation OBRAZ - Obránci zvířat; in the past I've served, among other things, as an adviser to a minister and as a member of the supervisory board of Povodí Labe. I've been involved in Ústí local politics for over 12 years, first as an ordinary citizen, later as a councillor. I received the Courage Award from Nadační fond proti korupci; based on my criminal complaint, the town clerk admitted in court to abuse of power. I won in court the right of citizens to speak at council meetings, uncovered million-crown extraordinary bonuses for senior officials, and I'm dealing, for example, with the illegal construction of villas near Habrovický rybník. In my free time I enjoy saunas – you'll find me, among other places, at Saunový svět Klíše – as well as hiking and running. My son was born in April.

The candidate's texts have been machine-translated from Czech.

Links and social media

@blazej_lukas Facebook

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