Environmental expert on Tallinn’s decision to abandon green transition: it gives the impression of burying one’s head in the sand

Author: Anete Kõlli

Editor: Henrik Ilveshenrik

Copyright: Delfi Media

Published with permission from Delfi Media

The Tallinn City Government announced today its decision to end climate and green transition activities funded by public money. According to opposition politicians, environmental experts, and a minister, the city’s living environment will suffer as a result of this backtracking.

According to Deputy Mayor Kristjan Järvan (Isamaa), all changes are based on the goal of reducing duplication, streamlining management, and directing resources to areas that provide immediate and visible benefits to city residents.

The city government plans to use the funds freed up by the layoffs and the termination of green activities to improve services for city residents, reorganize the city’s structure, and improve the quality of services, such as waste collection supervision.

Järvan did not specify which specific activities would be discontinued. According to the deputy mayor, Tallinn values clean nature and environmental protection, but does not consider it necessary to create additional climate bureaucracy that duplicates national and European Union objectives. “Therefore, we are generally discontinuing activities related to the development of the city’s independent climate and green transition policy and redirecting the freed-up resources to reorganizing the city’s structure and improving the quality of services,” he said.

Mayor: Green transition projects are not justified
Tallinn Mayor Peeter Raudsepp (also Isamaa) believes that the city has a duty to use taxpayers’ money responsibly and in ways that benefit city residents the most. “Green transition projects are not justified in this form. Instead, we are directing resources to areas that directly affect people’s everyday lives – waste collection supervision, urban space maintenance, and service quality.”

Järvan added that waste transport monitoring must be visible and effective. “We are strengthening controls to prevent situations that pose environmental risks and harm the living environment of residents.”

Seven positions related to green transition and climate action will be cut from the Tallinn Strategy Center.

The Sustainable and Energy-Efficient City Department will lose the positions of climate adaptation expert, renovation expert, housing coordinator, and sustainability management coordinator. In the Circular Economy Department, the positions of circular economy management specialist and circular economy expert will be eliminated, and an additional position of waste and monitoring specialist will be created.

The current position of energy efficiency expert will be renamed expert in the reorganized department. All other positions that were previously in the foreign projects office and the sustainable and energy-efficient city department will remain in the newly named foreign projects and apartment association support department.

According to Järvan, a new position will be created to strengthen waste transport supervision, ensuring better control and preventing situations where waste collection is delayed or environmental risks arise.

ELF: лоша новина
According to Joonas Plaan, member of the board of the Estonian Fund for Nature (ELF), this is regrettable news that demonstrates the city government’s disregard for its residents. “Regardless of the city government’s decision, climate change will not go away, but will only get worse,” Plaan noted.
He highlighted the increasingly severe rainstorms and frequent heat waves that the city has to cope with. According to Plaani, extreme weather conditions particularly affect the elderly and families with small children.

Regardless of the city government’s decision, climate change will not disappear, but will unfortunately only intensify.

Joonas Plaan, Member of the ELF Board

“If we add to this the tendency to withdraw funding from tram and bicycle lanes and to end the independent development of climate and green transition policies, it gives the impression of burying our heads in the sand – as if climate change did not exist and Tallinn’s living environment did not need improvement,” said Plaan, a native of Tallinn. “This raises a completely justified concern as to whether this is a city where one would want to raise one’s children.”

According to Plaan, Tallinn, as Estonia’s largest municipality, bears a great responsibility for implementing Estonia’s climate goals. Local governments play an important role in the development of renewable energy as well as in transport and urban planning. “Tallinn’s role in meeting climate goals cannot be underestimated, given the city’s economic weight and position as a transport hub. The claim that the state will now take care of everything and the city does not have to do anything is essentially a demagogic argument to avoid responsibility for this problem,” Plaan noted.

Ossinovski: Decision limits funding opportunities
Former Tallinn Mayor Jevgeni Ossinovski (SDE) considers the city government’s recent decisions a strategic step backwards. “I think it takes Tallinn’s development back about ten years,” said Ossinovski. According to him, the management system built over the past few years, in which environmental protection and consideration of climate risks played a natural role, is now being dismantled. “In terms of management quality, this is catastrophic,” added Ossinovski.

I think it takes Tallinn’s development back about ten years.
Jevgeni Ossinovski, former mayor

According to Ossinovski, the rejection of climate and green issues also affects Tallinn’s position in international networks to which Tallinn has belonged until now. It also limits the city’s opportunities to obtain international funding. “If Tallinn is no longer active in environmental policy and does not implement the climate goals it has set, it will limit our opportunities to obtain international funding both in the current period of EU funds and certainly in the next one,” said Ossinovski. “If we say we’re not interested, then of course we won’t get the money.”

A large part of Tallinn’s loan financing is done through international banks, whose loan terms are tied to sustainability goals. This is why, according to Ossinovski, it will be more difficult to finance the city’s investments in the future. “The city of Tallinn has received loans very cheaply because we have adequate environmental and sustainability policies, energy efficiency and climate risk mitigation,” he noted. According to Ossinovski, the current city government does not understand the long-term impact of its decisions. “This may seem like a nice Trumpist ideological blunder, but it has far-reaching and measurable consequences in money.”

The city government’s justification that the money freed up by the changes will be directed to waste transport supervision is disproportionate, according to Ossinovski. “We are talking about individual positions in waste transport supervision, a few tens of thousands of euros a year. If additional people are needed, they can be hired,” he said. Ossinovski considers it regrettable that tens of millions of euros a year were given up for this, which could have been invested in mobility and urban space.

Sutt: Tallinn must remain a good living environment
Minister of Energy and Environment Andres Sutt (Reform Party) said that the Ministry of Climate Change does not yet know the exact content of Tallinn’s decision or which activities will be terminated and who will be laid off. The minister also stressed that the work organization of the city government is within their own competence.

At the same time, Sutt acknowledged that Tallinn should still aim for a high quality of life. “It is a bit strange to read that the city government does not see a good quality of life and living environment as a priority,” he said. “As a citizen of the city, I want it to be nice for young, middle-aged and older people to be in Tallinn. This is the city government’s task and I think that no one has given them a mandate to move backwards and give up on taking care of Tallinn’s living environment,” the minister said.
The minister expressed hope that Tallinn still values ​​the desire to be one of the best capitals in the world and stands up for clean air, good planning and good public transport in the capital. “Almost a third of Estonia’s population lives in Tallinn and Tallinn is Estonia’s calling card. If the capital moves in a direction where we do not invest in better public transport, insulation of panel houses, separate waste collection and noise reduction, then this will affect Tallinn’s attractiveness as a place to live.”

Pere: This is an illiterate decision
According to Tallinn City Council member Pärtel-Peeter Pere (Reform Party), the city government’s decision not to deal with climate and green issues is expected, but regrettable. “Everyone was promised huge subsidies and now the money has to come from somewhere,” Pere stated.
The former deputy mayor doubts the quality and substantive justification of the city government’s decision and called it deeply problematic. He added that the decision deserves to go down in history as an example of illiterate city management. “It is illiterate when the mayor of a European capital says that the city’s task is not to deal with the green transition. This shows that a person is absolutely not familiar with the landscape in which he operates and does not understand where he has ended up,” said Pere.
Pere explained that cities play an important role in improving people’s quality of life and ensuring clean energy, traffic, air and safe mobility. Examples can be given from Paris, London, New York and the cities of the Nordic countries. “For years, it has been said how big a practical role cities play in any country. It is a clear task of local governments to deal with the green transition,” Pere noted.

Funding and Partnership