Excited to go to the city
Implementing the Resolution of the National Assembly on the arrangement of district and commune-level administrative units of Ha Tinh province in the period of 2023 - 2025, from January 1, 2025, 14 communes will be merged into Ha Tinh City, thereby increasing the natural area of Ha Tinh City by 4 times, reaching 220km2 and the population size is 266,321 people with 27 administrative units.
Living in Thach Khe commune, which has just been merged into Ha Tinh city, Mrs. Tran Thi Buoi (74 years old, in Thanh Lan village) excitedly shared, "I never expected that our Thach Khe commune would become a city. Now that we are a city, I hope that in the future, infrastructure and traffic routes will be invested in and upgraded, making it easier for people to travel."
Next to Thach Khe commune, Dinh Ban commune has also recently been merged into Ha Tinh city. This is one of the 5 communes affected by the Thach Khe iron mining project, so for many years, the traffic infrastructure, schools, and medical stations have been stuck in planning and have not been upgraded or repaired. Mr. Pham Cong Tung - Chairman of Dinh Ban commune People's Committee - said that currently, Dinh Ban commune has nearly 10% poor and near-poor households. People's lives in general are still very difficult.
The whole commune has more than 2,200 households, but only 600 households have access to clean water during the rainy season. In the summer, those 600 households also do not have enough water to use because the raw water source for clean water production is lacking.
This commune also does not have irrigation works to serve agricultural production. Therefore, farmers can only grow rice once a year thanks to rainwater, so productivity is low and life is difficult.
“The merger of Dinh Ban commune into Ha Tinh city is an exciting thing. From now on, we hope that our superiors will pay attention and allocate budget to invest in traffic infrastructure, renovate schools, commune halls, invest in clean water projects, irrigation works for agricultural production... so that the local economy and society can develop, rise, and be worthy of a commune that has become a city,” Mr. Tung shared.
Mr. Duong Van Thai - Chairman of the People's Committee of Thach Van commune - said that the merger of Thach Van commune into Ha Tinh city made officials and people very happy and excited, hoping that in the coming time, the state will pay attention to investing in infrastructure to develop and improve people's lives.
Many difficulties and challenges
According to the report of the People's Committee of Ha Tinh City, in 2024, Ha Tinh City will achieve and exceed 25/26 socio-economic targets. Of which, 13 targets will be achieved and 12 targets will exceed the plan. Economic growth rate will reach 12.45%. Budget revenue in 2024 will reach 1,280 billion VND, equal to 154% of the plan assigned by the province and 119% of the plan assigned by the city.
In 2024, Ha Tinh City will continue to renovate and upgrade traffic intersections, traffic light systems, road lighting systems, upgrade drainage systems, and bury telecommunication cables...
Basically completed upgrading, embellishing and expanding main roads such as Xuan Dieu Street, Nguyen Thi Minh Khai Street, Le Ninh Street, Quang Trung Street. Ha Tinh City has also planted 122,000 urban trees to develop in the direction of green urban areas.
After expanding its administrative boundaries, the Prime Minister decided to recognize the expanded Ha Tinh City as meeting the criteria of a type II urban area.
Mr. Duong Tat Thang - Member of the Standing Committee, Secretary of the Ha Tinh City Party Committee - shared that the arrangement of administrative units, merging 14 more communes into Ha Tinh City, increasing the total natural area by 4 times has opened up a large space for investment and development in the direction of becoming one of the urban centers of the North Central region.
Besides that advantage, the Secretary of the Ha Tinh City Party Committee also admitted that the expansion of Ha Tinh city to "embrace" many purely agricultural communes, including communes affected by the Thach Khe iron mine, which have long been stuck, have not received much investment in infrastructure, and the people's lives still have many difficulties, are also challenges for the city.
Therefore, in the coming time, Ha Tinh City will propose to the province to continue proposing to the Central Government to decide to stop exploiting Thach Khe iron mine to remove obstacles and build a plan for the city expansion.
From there, there are bases, facilities, and conditions for investment in infrastructure development, traffic routes, upgrading schools, medical stations, granting residential land to people who need to separate households, build houses, invest in building water supply works for people... to improve people's lives, and bring Ha Tinh city to develop in a civilized and modern manner.
