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Regional ONF branch to help improve standard of living

LIPETSK, January 04, /ITAR-TASS/. Russian Popular Front's /ONF/ regional branch in Lipetsk will focus on helping improve the standard of living, member of the ONF regional headquarters Oleg Kolyagin told Itar-Tass on Friday.

The ONF's Action Plan in Lipetsk includes measures to improve the ecological situation in the region which accommodates the Novolipetsk metallurgical works and is noted for traffic density. "It impacts residents' health; the region has a higher sickness rate compared with other provinces," said Kolyagin, chief doctor of the regional children's hospital.

The regional ONF branch also plans to pay special attention to the development of mass sports. "Whereas high performance sport enjoys the necessary support, mass sport is yet to be made an irreversible trend," Kolyagin said.

Each district of the region has already built a swimming pool of its own with local administration's support, and now they have to become sport centers with play-fields and skating rinks, he went on.

Lastly, the housing and public utilities sector and increasing costs of its services require close attention, the ONF official said.

"In addition to other problems, there appeared many firms in the region which used databases of the housing and public utilities sector to send outrageous bills to tenants and pocket the money. Many tenants were misled and paid these fake bills," Kolyagin said. lt's necessary to step up efforts in combating the fraud enlisting assistance from police."

The Lipetsk branch of the ONF was the first to be registered by the Justice Ministry.

"All ONF regional branches will go through the state registration procedure in the first quarter of 2014. The Lipetsk branch was the first to complete it," the ONF press service told Tass on Friday.

"We've passed the registration stage. The next step is to appoint head of the executive committee of the regional branch and open the ONF office in Lipetsk," it quoted representative of the ONF regional headquarters Nikolai Miloslavsky as saying.

The ONF set up its regional branches in all Russian regions last year. In 2014, the ONF is expected to open regional executive committees across the whole country.

The ONF's federal Executive Committee is headed by Andrei Bocharov.

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