Nine days before the upcoming mayoral elections in Sofia, the leading candidates are continuing to make new promises. Milen Velchev from the National Movement Simeon II promised to lower heating prices for poor families. Bulgarian Socialist Party candidate Tatyana Doncheva said that she would provide support for the handicapped, while Democrats for Strong Bulgaria's Svetoslav Gavriyski promised to deal with the street dogs problem, Novinar newspaper reported.
Velchev proposed the creation of a separate municipal fund to provide 50 leva a month to poor families. The money in the fund will be collected through loans on public property. At the same time, Doncheva met representatives of various organisations working with Bulgarians with disabilities. They presented some of the main problems in integrating the disabled into society, such as difficult access to public buildings and the high level of unemployment. According to Doncheva, the problem could be solved by setting up a permanent committee. Gavriyski said that he saw stray dogs as one of the main problems requiring a solution. One solution, Gavriyski said, would be to sterilise the dogs, which would lead to the gradual disappearance of the problem.