The Botoșani County Council has spent about 55,000 euros on laptops and internet subscriptions for county councilors. Most of them were not used at any elected session, many of them entrepreneurs who did not need such devices.
County Council meeting from 2024 photo botosaninews.ro
The Botoșani County Council (CJ) has been practicing a true “laptopiada” for about four years. Or to better explain the phenomenon we can specify that from 2021 to March 2025, the CJ spent around 55 thousand euros for mobile data trafficking and subscriptions. The laptops, equipped with the related Internet subscription are intended for county councilors. Peak, some of them are businessmen or people who can easily their own laptop. Not to mention the fact that at the meetings of the County Council, most of the laptops bought by the institution were never used.
The laptops in the time of the pandema
The story of the laptops from the County Council begins in the spring of 2021. More precisely, at the beginning of March, of that year, the management of the County Council decided to contract 33 internet subscriptions with mobile data trafficking, which included modem, but also a laptop. The subscriptions were valid for 24 months and cost about 30,000 euros. The entire digital package was offered to the county councilors to use it for monthly meetings. The heads of the County Council have motivated the investment by the fact that the agenda and all the necessary materials to the county councilors, at meetings, will be sent in electronic format. “The county councilors receive everything that means material for the council meetings in electronic format. Practically, we no longer make available to the counselors all the materials in letric format”said Doina Federovici, president of Botosani County Council, in 2021.
Moreover, the laptops would have been useful, being a pandemic time, for online sessions, because the package contained a software for organizing sessions in the audioconference system. However, the county councilors received the laptops after lifting the restrictions, when it could actually meet in physical format. I mean, they were useless from this point of view. The investment has aroused astonishment among many chosen counties. And this is because a good part of them were businessmen, managers in large companies and even entrepreneurs in the IT field. “I think all the county councilors allow a laptop or any device for connection”said in 2021, the county councilor Viorel Iliuţă. “Did anyone ask us if we need it? No!”added another county councilor, who, at that time had an IT company.
The county council leadership has changed, laptops have changed
Four years have passed since the investment. The leadership of the County Council was also changed. Instead of the Social Democrat Doina Federovici at the head of the county came the Liberal Valeriu Iftime. The story with laptops instead has repeated. Specifically, in March, other laptops were received, instead of four years ago, with the more than 30 subscriptions and modems.
The whole story cost about 25,000 euros. The new leadership of the County Council motivated by saying that the existing contract for the 32 internet subscriptions with mobile data, of the county councilors was actually extended. And the new laptops also came to the pack. “The opposite for the Internet was renewed and they ended for the county councilors 30 and some contracts. Other laptops came to the pack”says the vice -president of the County Council, Constantin Bursuc. Likewise, it is not known what they will do with these subscriptions.
“The old ones were given to our officials”
Neither new nor old laptops, mostly, were used by county councilors at meetings. The heads of the County Council say that the old ones were given to the institution’s officials. As well as among the new ones, which will not be desired by the county councilors, they will also reach the employees of the County Council. “The old ones were given to our officials from the County Council. Now another contract has been concluded and we had the possibility that these or some of the new ones, to give them to our officials”adds Vice President Bursuc.
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