Czech town, Romani residents want playground, other residents object

News server Deník.cz reports that the Kutná Hora town hall and a local Romani civic association called Čercheň want to renovate a sports field in the quarter of Neškaredice. Other local residents are not in favor of the idea.

"The playground won’t be kept up. Look what happened to the last one. There’s nothing left of it. Now it will be repaired and another CZK 100 000 will go to waste," resident Petr Hýžďal, chair of the Neškaredice Civic Association, explained the main objection of some citizens to the project. In other words, he believes the CZK 100 000 the town intends to invest into renovating the sports ground is a waste of money because its equipment will soon be destroyed and stolen.

"This is my second time being a mayor. I lived abroad and served as a mayor there, and this is the first time I have heard the opinion that someone doesn’t want a playground. When I was living abroad, if someone offered something like a playground, everyone would snatch it up. Suddenly, here we are in Neškaredice and a civic association here, which should be standing up for some kind of progressive interests and public opinions, is protesting against a playground," Mayor Ivo Šanc commented.

Romani residents want the playground to be reconstructed and the project came about through their initiative. "Be normal, give the children a chance, a place to play… Half a year ago we were addressing the fact that children have nowhere to play here, they’re out in the street and cars are honking at them. I was even tasked back then with keeping an eye on it. What are we even talking about here?" asked Milan Kaleja, a representative of Romani residents in Neškaredice, during Monday’s public meeting of the town council.

The two civic associations proved unable to agree on shared administration of the sports field. The Čercheň association will therefore be solely responsible for it.

"We thought you would be interested in supervising the playground from both places. We know it won’t be easy. However, if we never try anything, if we tell ourselves there’s no point, then there really will be no point," Vice-Mayor Jiří Franc remarked on the failure to reach agreement with all of the citizens.

Monday’s public meeting in Neškaredice revealed how tense relations still are between both communities there, as well as the relationship of one of them to the town hall. Non-Romani residents of the quarter, which is considered a socially excluded locality and is working with the Czech Government Agency for Social Inclusion, have long criticized the town hall for its lax approach toward their problems. They say the quarter lacks sewer lines, good street lighting and public trash cans, that they don’t need a playground now and don’t want to take care of one.

The emotional exchange of opinions with the mayor and vice-mayor eventually involved more than the "unwanted" sports field, as Neškaredice residents reminded officials of their problems with hygiene and security. "There are many things we want and have asked for, and to this day practically none of them are resolved. There are maybe only three or four out of 10 points addressed," complained Hýžďal.

The mayor reminded the meeting that work is underway on a sewer line project which should be completed by 2014 or 2015. "I believe the municipality is now cleaner than it was, and I believe that the interpersonal conditions have improved here as well," remarked Mayor Šanc.

The mayor prompted the most emotion among residents by noting that during a volunteer street-cleaning brigade, organized by the Romani association Čercheň, he had not seen anyone from the Neškaredice Civic Association out in the streets as well. In frenetic responses to his remark, non-Romani residents claimed they clean up their neighborhoods regularly while their Romani fellow-citizens do not.

"Mr Mayor, don’t get angry, but I live right behind the nursery school, and when I take my trash out I collect trash all along the way. It doesn’t have to be organized, I pick up trash every week. I go out the next day and there’s more trash. Don’t say we don’t do anything," one non-Romani resident responded.

"I do prize the fact that you take care of your neighborhood. However, what I was talking about was my direct experience with an event during which 25 children were cleaning up the streets. It won’t happen overnight, but when someone leads them to that point they are developing a relationship to their environment, at least a bit," the mayor responded.

Despite the objections of some residents, the sports field will be completed next year. The fenced-off grounds will be equipped with goal nets for football, a bench and a playscape. It will only be accessible during opening hours. Neškaredice is the only neighborhood in Kutná Hora without such a sports field.