Members of the Economic Council discussed the “Skele” Business Zone, the draft budget for 2025, and the enrollment policy for the 2025/26 school year

At today’s 15th regular meeting of the Economic Council of the Municipality of Brod, the members of this advisory body discussed the possibilities for the construction of the “Skele” Business Zone. Also on the agenda were the draft budget for the Municipality of Brod for the next year and the enrollment plan for high schools for the 2025/2026 school year.

Speaking about the topic that attracted the most attention, the construction of the “Skele” Business Zone, the Mayor of Brod, Milan Zečević, said that “this issue, like all others, is being approached in a planned and systematic manner.”

“By the next Economic Council meeting, I hope that we will deliver cadastral extracts to clearly identify the ownership of all parcels within the ‘Skele’ Business Zone. We will determine where traffic routes are already prescribed, and together with the Electric Utility and our communal company, we will provide an estimated cost sheet so we know how much the installation of sewage and water collectors will cost, as well as a transformer station that could be expanded and developed to supply the entire future ‘Skele’ Business Zone,” he stated.

Another topic of today’s session was the draft budget for the upcoming year, the final proposal of which will be presented at the 2nd regular session of the Municipality of Brod Assembly, scheduled for December 25.

“It was very important for us, both from the perspective of the municipal administration and from the perspective of the economy, to clarify to all participants in tonight’s Council the exact situation. We still do not have the complete findings, as the audit process is ongoing. Therefore, we expect to hold a special thematic session on the same day as the regular session, with the audit findings,” said the Mayor of Brod and added:

“The audit will tell us the exact financial situation and will certainly provide some recommendations, the implementation of which we will consult with our councilors, as well as the Economic Council.”

Zečević said that it was of great importance for this advisory body to be informed about “the currently established situation in the financial sector of our municipality.”

“This time, the budget is significantly larger because we had to project and anticipate that, starting from January 1 next year, the Health Center will become part of our budget. The municipal budget is 14 million, and about 2.7 million marks is the Health Center’s budget, which tells us that the budget of Brod has increased to nearly 17 million marks,” he said and added:

“With this budget, we must be rational. 17 million marks is certainly an impressive figure, and it would be very easy to manage if it were sustainable, allowing us to be solvent and reach a positive zero. However, according to the handover report between me and the former mayor, we found 5.6 million marks in short-term obligations and about 1 million marks of withdrawn funds from various donors that were spent for unintended purposes, which we will either have to return or use for the intended purposes in the next year.”