or better yet, invest them in the fight against the crooks who are robbing all of us. It has happened. We’ve finally reached the point of raising money.
As I wrote before New Year’s, we will fund the "RosPil" project together.
Once again, briefly about the concept:
Federal Law No. 94-FZ (one of the few decent things in our legislation) makes it fairly easy for all of us to spot fraud by officials in public procurement.
Stories about $2 million websites, beds and tables covered in gold, Lexus cars for rural hospitals, CT scanners bought for $4 million when they cost $1 million, and so on appear every day.
We are already flooded with such reports.
The level of corruption in public procurement is staggering. Even Medvedev himself says that 1 trillion rubles is stolen from it every year.
There is no point expecting officials to rush headlong into fighting their own corruption.
So that means we have to do something ourselves. Obviously, we cannot create an alternative FSB (Russia’s security service), prosecutor’s office, or firing squad.
But certain efforts can be quite effective. Even the rather chaotic activity through my little LiveJournal blog has already led to the cancellation of corrupt tenders worth 243 million rubles.
Accordingly, our task is to build a small but hard-hitting structure that, relying on a large number of activists and formal legal mechanisms, will make life hell for specific crooks.
We have no problem with the large number of activists—more than two thousand people have already registered on RosPil.
What we need now are lawyers who will bluntly and methodically write complaints, file appeals, and go to court and to the anti-monopoly service’s commissions.
Three to six people, depending on how much money we raise.
How much money do we need to raise?
Minimum goal: 3 million rubles a year
Maximum goal: 5 million rubles a year
Is this possible?
I believe it is. If it works, it will be the first example in the history of post-Soviet Russia of a major civic project being funded this way, rather than through a grant or a single wealthy sponsor.
Existing independent charitable projects operate successfully and raise much more, so we can raise this too.
How much will you personally pay?
As I said, I myself will contribute 30,000 rubles a year, plus cover minor organizational expenses.
What exactly will the money be spent on?
A very small amount will go to pay for the RosPil server; the rest will go to salaries—for the project coordinator/lawyer and the lawyers.
We may also pay for expert evaluations in complicated cases.
I will choose the coordinator myself, and we will recruit the lawyers on a competitive basis. I will publish the job announcement on LiveJournal.
All expenses will be made public, itemized down to the last kopek.
Will these be fully official, tax-paid salaries?
RosPil obviously implies that everything will be fully official and above board. Partly because we are for law and order, and partly because the moment we give anyone even the slightest excuse to come after us, everyone will show up—from the FSB (Russia’s security service) to the fire inspectors.
Unfortunately, fully official salaries mean taxes. You can thank the current government, which does not want to raise excise taxes on tobacco and alcohol but does raise payroll taxes: in order to give someone 100 rubles in salary, we have to collect 147 rubles (income tax and social insurance contributions).
So you should understand that a very significant share of what we raise will end up in the hands of the very people who organize these kickback schemes. But that is only one more reason to work better :)
How will this all be formalized?
You simply give the money to me as a gift. And I sign employment contracts with the people who work for us.
What will the salaries be?
They will be market-rate salaries. We will determine the exact amounts and publish them based on the pace of fundraising over the first couple of weeks.
How can we verify that you are not taking the money for yourself?
After a lot of thought, we concluded that at the first stage we will collect funds through Yandex.Money.
What’s more, the guys from Yandex approached us themselves and said: "You’re going to collect through us anyway. Let us explain everything to you ourselves, otherwise you’ll mess it up and then start shouting that Yandex and the FSB stole Navalny’s money."
The account has two keys. One key allows transactions to be made—it will be held only by me. The second key allows you to view all transactions made: where the money came from and where it went. I will give this second key to 8–10 people whom everyone knows and respects. These people are not connected to me and will serve as a guarantee of oversight for all of you.
If I decide to steal the public cashbox, I will be caught immediately.
I will announce the names of these people soon.
In fact, this second key could simply be published so that everyone could view the account transactions. But that would mean that in some cases everyone would also be able to see the donors, some of whom may prefer to remain anonymous.
Who will know that I donated money?
If you want people to know, we will write it in gold letters in a special section. If you do not want that, no one will know. Even a transfer from a bank account allows us to see only the account number, not the account holder’s name. And if you send money through an "iron kiosk" (a payment terminal—the kind people also use to top up mobile phones), identifying you personally is simply impossible.
Will this count as taxable income for you?
No. I am not receiving money as such, but Yandex.Money, which is not legally money but a claim right.
In short, this lets us save 13% in income tax.
Will we be buying weapons and ammunition with this money?
No. Not yet.
How will we measure effectiveness?
A detailed report on the work of everyone funded under this scheme will be published on the website.
How much should I send?
Whatever you think is appropriate.
Do you promise that my money will be invested in the tears, gray hair, and possible imprisonment of corrupt officials?
YES!
Money is burning a hole in my pocket! I want to help the RosPil project! What should I do?
Yandex.Money account number: 41001859832724
In the payment purpose field, you should write "Gift" and (optionally) include your name if you want to see it written in gold letters in the section "Who Pays for RosPil."
Main ways to transfer money to the account:
Bank cards
Terminals
Internet banking
ATMs
Prepaid cards
Money transfer and payment systems
Answers to any payment-related questions are here.
As we go, we will try to add any other legal methods of funding.
Let’s go.
Let’s show the crooks that we can fund a project to fight them without oligarchs and Western grants.