Maxima Legal takes part in discussion of the town-planning policy of Saint Petersburg

The head of real estate and construction practice, Evgeny Druzhinin, took part in the annual Construction Forum held by publishing house Kommersant.

The  Saint Petersburg Property Fund housed the forum titled ACTUAL ISSUES OF CONSTRUCTION INDUSTRY. PROFESSIONAL VIEW held on 27 March 2014.

Among the speakers at the event one may note the heads of the Investments Committee of the Government of Saint Petersburg, Committee for State Control, Utilization and Protection of Historical and Cultural Landmarks, Non-Commercial Partnership Association of Builders of Saint Petersburg, the Russian Guild of Managers and Developers, senior officers of the leading building and developing companies of the city.  
Expert discussion centred on the increase in the investment prospects of the region, looking for the agreeable ways to develop city territories and analysis of the recent trends in the commercial and industrial real estate.  A lot of attention was paid to summarizing of the results of the participation of Russian delegation in the world biggest investment fairy MIPIM 2014.  

In his speech Evdeny Druzhinin highlighted those legal aspects that the developers involved in construction of social infrastructure facilities face in course of their implementation of integrated urban development projects.

"The today's discussion demonstrated the absence of clear understanding of the scope of functions and obligations of public institutions and the same of private developers upon the implementation of IUD projects.  Evidently, the representatives of developers, town-planning and project organizations and state authorities remain at odds over the question whether a developer should assume town-planning functions and be responsible for the allocation of infrastructure facilities or those functions and responsibilities fall within the competence of state authorities.

The problem involves applicable town-planning laws which, in fact, take as a premise that a developer should not perform functions of a town-planner. Laws just have no models permitting a developer to assume such responsibilities in full.  Even when a socially conscious developer is ready to assume such responsibilities he faces a number of various legal and tax problems. Unfortunately, this problem can be solved at the level of Saint Petersburg only", Evgeny concludes.