ZAGREB, 6 March, 2021 - The Homeland Movement (DP) leader, Miroslav Škoro, on Saturday presented his agenda as a mayoral candidate in the Croatian capital city of Zagreb, and on that occasion he said if elected, he would provide free-of-charge services in the city's kindergartens as of this autumn.

"I assure you that the Jakuševac landfill will be closed and that waste management will be improved," Škoro said in Zagreb's Cvjetni Trg Square.

He also promised the construction of a state-of-the-art hospital and of a national stadium which could maybe named after the late footballer Zlatko Cici Kranjčar.

One of Škoro's promises is the reduction of the city surcharge by three percentage points.

"One epoch is over and it is high time we introduced a new model of managing Zagreb in accordance with the needs of its residents and the 21st century," said Škoro, who confirmed speculations that he would run for the Zagreb mayor a few days after the funeral of the mayor Milan Bandić.

Škoro also expressed his readiness to make a coalition with everybody provided that there is no trade-off or blackmailing. 

ZAGREB, Sept 10, 2020 - A state-of-the-art kindergarten built in Croatian-US partnership was inaugurated in Sisak on Thursday by Ambassador Robert Kohorst and Mayor Kristina Ikic Banicek.

The Sunce kindergarten is worth HRK 8.5 million and the US government co-financed it with HRK 4. million, which was used to build the structure, while the town paid for its equipment and a playground.

Eighty-five preschool children are attending kindergarten.

Present at the inauguration, among others, were high US army envoys in Croatia and representatives of Croatia's Defence Ministry and Armed Forces General Staff.

Ambassador Kohorst said he was glad to be in Sisak today to witness such a beautiful event.

He said the US was proud that its military recognized the need to build a kindergarten in Sisak and that the US government concluded the deal with local contractors, who built the structure.

Kohorst said he was glad the US military had a humanitarian aid program within its portfolio and that it initiated the construction of the kindergarten with $710,000.

He added that the kindergarten was a symbol of Croatian-US friendship which was and would be very important for both countries.

The mayor thanked him for the donation and underlined the importance of the new building, saying the previous premises were inadequate.

"Two years passed since the first contact with the Embassy, i.e. the US government, and the opening of the kindergarten. I believe this isn't the only one, that there will be more projects like this. Now we have a modern building and happy children, parents, and teachers."

Headmistress Sandra Kramaric also thanked the Americans. "We had been waiting for a new kindergarten for 20 years. Today we are proud of the new building."

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Four Croatian cities are trying to make it easier at least financially for parents when it comes to caring for their children. Umag, Belišće, Vrlika and Obrovac are the only Croatian towns to ensure free kindergarten for kids, removing at least one worry from the heads of their parents.

As Poslovni Dnevnik writes on the 21st of January, 2019, in addition to employment, decent salaries and a resolved housing issue for young families, a key prerequisite for changing the negative demographic picture in the Republic of Croatia is the development of a network of nurseries and kindergartens which are made readily available to parents in need of them.

The Croatian towns in which parents, when it comes to kindergartens, have at least the financial side of things taken care of for them are Umag, Belišće, Vrlika and Obrovac. These towns are, as previously mentioned, the only four towns in the whole of Croatia that provide free kindergartens for all their children, as was reported by the portal Gradonacelnik.hr.

Until just a few days ago, there were only three towns offering such measures - Umag, Vrlika and Obrovac, and now they have been joined by Belišće, whose administration, headed by Dinka Burić, recently lowered the prices of kindergartens from 410 to 300 kuna. Upon the further analysis of budget items and revenues, they have since realised that they can provide an additional 700,000 kuna, giving parents in the area completely free kindergartens for their kids.

Although a formal decision is still yet to be made on the 28th of January, the move has been effective since January the 1st, meaning that the parents who have children needing kindergartens in Belišće no longer have to think about payments of any kind.

Thanks to European Unoon tenders and intensified local self-government activities in project preparation, nearly 200 new kindergartens are being prepared or constructed in their various different stages across the Republic of Croatia, with lack of capacity and the unavailability of accommodation becoming less and less of a problem.

Give our dedicated lifestyle  page a follow for more on Croatia's demographic problem, and to stay up to date with other Croatian towns and cities which follow in the footsteps of Umag, Obrovac, Vrlika and Belišće.

Children are full of an enviable amount of energy, and in the popular Istrian city of Pula, an idea that is totally unique in Croatia has come to the minds of those wanting to harness the mild climate and create what is being described as an outdoor, forest kindergarten.

As Poslovni Dnevnik writes on the 28th of December, 2018, grazed knees, muddy clothes, jumping around in ponds, climbing the trees, cold, rosy cheeks and smiling faces are everything that should be expected of a child, and Pula has come up with an innovative idea to harness childrens' curiosity for the outdoors, an idea entirely unique in Croatia.

As Glas Istre reports, the vision is that of a happy early childhood spent a unique ''forest kindergarten'' which is an idea that should come to life during springtime in Pula. The conceptual initiator of this unique idea is psychologist and certified nanny Francesca Miličević, who is herself a mother of a two-year-old child.

When asked how she came to the idea of ​​opening a kindergarten where most of the time children would stay outside, she said that she had observed how it's done in Scandinavian countries, and that she united various pedagogical systems, as well as permaculture, ecology, and of course, spirituality.

''The Kindergarten is being created in cooperation with the Heartface association and another specialist organisation, and the process of leasing a part of the forest at Veli vrh from Croatian Forests (Hrvatske Šume) is already underway,'' stated Milićević, explaining that this kindergarten will receive children from ages threee to six, and the idea is unique in Croatia as it will differ from the classic type of kindergarten in that the emphasis will be placed primarily on the children spending more time out in the open, enjoying nature, regardless of the weather conditions.

''We're blessed with the climate, it's the end of December, and outside there is beautiful sunshine. These kind of kindergartens are common in countries where the winter is extremely cold, so getting too cold isn't something that really needs to be feared. Indeed, scientific research proves that children who spend more time outdoors, in the fresh air, are healthier than those who spend more time in confined spaces,'' says the kickstarter of this kindergarten which will be one of a kind, and unique in Croatia.

Make sure to follow our dedicated lifestyle page for much more.

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