Mayor's Labor Unit

BASIC CITY DATA

• Population size: 1,082,000

• Population growth rate (%): 0.70

• Surface area (sq.km): 353.00

• Population density (people/sq.km): 3,065.00

• GDP per capita (USD): 497.00

• GINI index: 0.43

• Main source of prosperity: industry
  

ABSTRACT

The project “Mayor’s Labor Unit” has been implemented in Krasnoyarsk since 2004 and has become widespread and popular with more than 4,000 teenagers taking part in it every year. The unit members’ yellow T-shirts have become a landmark of Krasnoyarsk. Innovative idea of the project is to provide teenagers with a chance of first employment. Due to increased attention to the teenagers’ working conditions, commercial companies often refrain from employing teenagers. The project “Mayor’s Labor Unit” gives teenagers an opportunity to get a job and, as a result, an employment record book, a bank account and, of course, first working experience and first earned income. Within the framework of the project, brigades of under-age workers under the supervision of an adult foreman clean and decorate the streets of the city, as well as do socially significant types of work such as teaching older people computer skills, providing hairdresser services for pensioners and cleaning apartments for retired people and veterans. The project is constantly developing and is currently implemented around the whole Krasnoyarsk Territory under the name of "High School Students Labor Units". The project’s technology has also been introduced for 3 years in Novosibirsk. The project is open to all teenagers and provides for the creation of teams for teenagers with disabilities. The Unit members take part in environmental actions - collecting plastics, batteries and waste paper, social actions - cleaning up the graves of the Great Patriotic War veterans, and assist in organization of sports and educational events.

BACKGROUND INFORMATION 

"Mayors' Labor Unit" project is regulated by the Resolution of Krasnoyarsk City Administration №87 (the most recent version of June 25th, 2018) and is implemented in order to further develop the youth policy within the framework of the municipal program "Development of the Youth Policy of the City of Krasnoyarsk" for 2018 and the planning period 2019-2020, approved by the Resolution of Krasnoyarsk City Administration of November 13, 2012, N 730, guided by the Charter of the City of Krasnoyarsk.

ORIGINS

The driving force behind the initiative was the vacuum, which appeared after the break-up of the Soviet Union in the sphere of youth policy. The new economic state of Russia demanded new approaches in upringing the new generation of young people. While in the times of the Soviet Union the work places were provided to the youth on a government policy basis, the new rules of the game put young people in a position when they had to look for their first jobs themselves. Which posed a problem, as increased attention to the teenagers’ working conditions, made commercial companies often refrain from employing teenagers.

So the experience of the first real employment, provided by the Mayor's Labor Unit project, was a very important one.

Another reason was the necessity to change the so called "consumer's approach" in teenagers. The idea was to teach them, that the citizens (young people included) are the real driving force to make the changes in their home city real. That is why "Mayor's" is not only in the title, but also in real meetings of the unit members with the Mayor and other representatives of the City administration, including discussions of the problems the city faces and their possible solutions.

The goals of the initiative should be formulated in terms of human development and empowerment as this is exactly what the initiative aims at - the development of young people (working skills, team work, creativity, etc.) and their empowerment (teaching them to be bold in their initiatives to change the life of the city and its citizens for the better).

Officially, as stated in the City administration regulation on the Mayors' Labor Unit:

The activities of the Labor Unit of the Head of the City of Krasnoyarsk are aimed at the solution of the following tasks:

• organization of temporary jobs for under-age citizens aged 14 to 18 years in their free time from study to gain work skills and work experience in the team;

• conducting career guidance work with under-aged citizens aged 14 to 18 years, obtaining professional skills by students of institutions of primary, secondary and higher vocational education;

• organization of leisure and employment of teenagers and young people in their free time.

The development of the Mayor's Labor Unit project involves cooperation and joint work of various participating parties. The organizer and the main "engine" of the project is the Krasnoyarsk city administration and its Youth Policy Department. The operator of the project is MAU "Travellers' Center". But many other organizations provide their help and assistance, such as libraries, museums, Natural Reserve "Stolby", Artists' Society, etc. Besides that the Unit members often cooperate with different condominium partnerships, when they decorate the territory of yards in different micro-districts of the city.

According to the City administration regulation on the Mayors' Labor Unit:

1. The expenses for organizing the activities of the Unit are covered by the city budget for the current fiscal year, provided for under the municipal program "Development of the Youth Policy of the City of Krasnoyarsk" for the relevant financial year and planning period, as well as at the expense of the regional and federal budgets, funds raised.

2. Provision of workers of the detachment with uniform, equipment, building materials and household equipment is carried out by the Unit organizer - Krasnoyarsk "Tourists' Center"

3. Employment, calculation and payment of wages to all workers of the Unit are carried out by the Unit organizer.
   

INNOVATIVE ASPECTS

The nature of the initiative is more evolutionary than revolutionary, as in the Soviet times there were certain examples of pioneer and komsomol working brigades.

The idea was present, but it pended realization in a new political and economical conditions.

One more important point is that since the very start of the Mayor's Labor Unit it has been constantly developing and not a single year was spent without certain changes and additions to the Unit members' activities.

The innovative element of the initiative is the direct involvemnet of the teenagers into real, on the ground, life of the city, into facing the problems and looking for ther possible solutions, in understanding the importance of the role of the youth in the adult world.     

The Mayor's Labor Unit initiative has received support from the citizens of Krasnoyarsk since the day its implementation started. The only obstacle or, rather, a restriction the initiative faces is a financial one as the city budget can finance only a certain number of working positions for the Unit members, while the number of kids wishing to become the members of the Unit is growing every year.

DESIRED CHANGE OR OUTCOME

The Mayor's Labor Unit has already outgrown the city level - it is currently implemented around the whole Krasnoyarsk Territory. And it has already spred into other regions of Russia - for example, it has already been implemented in Novosibirsk for 3 years.

The effects of the project are multiple, starting with providing teenagers with a first working place (and more than 100000 teenagers have already been given temporary employment within the project) and to changing the whole approach of teenagers to their home city, to upbringing in them the responsibility for the place where they live. And one must understand that the project, though aimed at teenagers, affects not only them but many more people, including their families, old and disabled people that they help, and even those citizens that simply pass these kids in yellow T-shirts, working in the streets to keep Krasnoyarsk clean and beautiful, and feeling proud for them.       

The Mayor's Labor Unit is itself a tool, a constantly changing one, with new applications developed every year.

Having started as the initiative of the city administration, this project has already become the initiative of the young generation of Krasnoyarsk citizens, as many of them have been (and stayed in their hearts) member of the Unit. That is the reason why this initiative constantly bears new ideas, as it happend, for example, in 2013, when new approach was developed - "the territory of responsibility" - within which whole territories of the city (parks, yards, recreation spaces, etc.) are now supervised by unit members (which includes keeping those places clean, beautiful, accessible and developed).  

Generally speaking, the Mayor's Labor Unit initiative gives all citizens of Krasnoyask as well as people all over Russia and abroad that the City of Krasnoyarsk cares about the new generation of its citizens, pays careful attention to their upbringing and is ready to assist them in entering the adult world.

It also changes the approach of young people to keeping their city clean and beatiful - the task is to change the paradigm from "someone will make my city clean and beatiful and I'll enjoy it then" to "we are the citizens of Krasnoyars, we are in charge of its present and future and it is our mutual duty to make our hometown clean and beatiful".     

LEARNING ASPECTS

First employment is a very important landmark in a teenager's life. Mayor's Labor Unit provides teenagers with a first work, which gives a unit member an undersdanding of how important and useful their work is. Making your own city clean and beautiful, helping its older citizens lead a better life, taking part in preparation of the events important for the whole city - this gives a very good start for future development of healthy working habits. Besides, starting their work life "on the streets" young people learn to respect and appreciate the work of the city services. Krasnoyarsk City Administration is ready to share this successful practice with any interested parties.

RELEVANCE TO SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT GOALS

Goal 8: Promote sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth, full and productive employment and decent work for all