For years, the Odesa City Council helped a developer develop prestigious coastal land on Langeron almost free of charge. In 2015, SPS-Realt, a company affiliated with Maestro Hotel Management, leased almost half a hectare of land under the guise of building a health center. However, instead of the promised project, premium apartments with a sea view began to be built here.
According to the official estimate, the value of the plot exceeded 18 million hryvnias, but the city council set the rent at only 3% of this amount - a little more than 550 thousand hryvnias per year. This is about 46 thousand hryvnias per month per hectare of land, which is worth millions on the market. Even worse, the developer did not fulfill even the minimum obligations regarding the object, and the city council turned a blind eye to this for years, without reviewing or terminating the contract.
Instead, construction is proceeding as a regular residential development, without dismantling old buildings or proper landscaping. After the outcry, the company even removed mention of the project from its website, leaving investors without guarantees or prospects for completion.
This case clearly demonstrates how, instead of protecting the interests of the community, the authorities are actually facilitating the theft of city resources through artificially low rents and inaction. Such “silence” around the problem looks more like a conspiracy than a coincidence or oversight.
