Romania’s Minister of European Investment and Projects Dragos Pislaru, together with the Executive Vice-President of the European Commission for Cohesion and Reforms, Raffaele Fitto, on November could go to Brosteni, a town in Suceava County seriously affected by the August floods, to see how things have been restored, including under the Restore Mechanism.

According to Pislaru, EUR 15 million were immediately made available through this instrument and reached the people affected by the floods in the counties of Neamt and Suceava, for the restoration of infrastructure. Also, discussions took place in Brussels that the expenses related to the sanitation of the areas and the urgent repairs can also be reimbursed from European funds.

„Restore is a good practice, and in the government meeting in which Mr. Arafat presented to us, on a Friday, immediately when the floods occurred, the things that happened, it was for me that thought ‘why not use this regulation’, which had just been signed, initialled in December 2024. Not many people knew about it. I admit that I remembered it, I looked for the details and I said to myself ‘Man, yes’ it’s exactly what we need’. I mean, in addition to the large Solidarity fund, where you have to raise more, there is a threshold of EUR 450 millions, roughly speaking, so that you can submit an application, the Restore is meant that from the money you already have in the Cohesion area and, I repeat, we have money, so that you can immediately allocate resources for this part of reconstruction, to do ‘build back better’, so that you can repair it even better than it was before,” the minister told AGERPRES in a recent interview.

He said that after the government meeting he contacted the European Commission to see how to proceed in order to receive the amounts.

„Immediately after that government meeting (…), in the following days, I spoke with the European Commission, I saw the details, I saw what needs to be done and I used the Nord-Est Regional Program, in which I convened the monitoring committee in less than three weeks for the approval of a special Restore axis. We put these EUR 15 million as a first source of funding. We will see if it is still necessary to upload it additionally, but for now these 15 million have become eligible from the moment of approval. So, at this point, money is available. I kept in touch with the president of Suceava and with my colleagues from Neam? and what I can tell you is that now we are including in certain discussions – and I discussed when I was in Brussels – including those expenses that they had immediately – to remove the mud, those immediate repairs – to be able to settle them and for this we work a little, because they are not typical ERDF expenses and now even the Commission, because it did not have many countries to apply, must guide us a little how the settlements are made. But the amounts are available and, even if it is not an extraordinarily large amount, it is super beneficial for the reconstruction especially of the local infrastructure that was destroyed,” Pîslaru said.

The minister added that most of the affected houses have already been repaired with the help of volunteers.

„On the side of houses, of housing, there were other types of measures, including the local and county authorities, together with the volunteers, repaired most of them. I know, that we were discussing now, that we invited the Executive Vice-President Raffaele Fitto, who is in charge of Cohesion, to come to the country and we were thinking of going to BroĄteni to see how we could rearrange things, including with the Restore fund. And, yes, when it comes, most likely a good part of the community, of the dedicated infrastructure will be put back on its feet, which is absolutely fabulous in terms of reaction speed and using European money for Romanians, so that people can really stop suffering and can benefit from a good standard of living again. This would be the idea: to propose to the executive vice-president that we go to that area precisely to see with our eyes, on the spot, how a European solidarity and rapid reaction program can turn into benefits for Romanians. (…) This is exactly the solidarity and benefits that we, Romanians, must be aware of coming from membership in the European Union,” he said.

Pislaru added that on November 21, Raffaele Fitto and Executive Vice-President for Social Rights and Skills, Quality Jobs and Preparedness Roxana Minzatu, will be in Romania at a conference of cohesion ministers.

AGERPRES