The insolvency administrator “Adminova” appealed to the municipality regarding the takeover of the premises of the apartment building at Birutės Street 22 – an electrical transformer station.
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“They appealed to the municipality several times, and once we responded to them in writing – that the municipality definitely does not intend to take over this property,” says Edvardas Simokaitis, head of the municipality’s Property Management Department.
On Wednesday, at the meeting of the Klaipėda Council’s City Economy and Environmental Protection Committee, he asked for the politicians’ support and stated that the municipality does not know how to manage such property.
“Since it is specific – premises for an electrical transformer station, the municipality has neither specialists nor competence for managing such premises,” the head of the department stated at the meeting.
According to E. Simokaitis, along with the substation, the city would also have to take over large premises where the residents of the apartment building currently have their storage rooms.
“These premises are in an apartment building, and its accessory is more than 500 square meters of storage space, which are residents’ storage rooms that have already been sold to the residents.
A truly very strange real estate object has been formed. (…) We would really have nothing to do with it once we take it over, except to maintain it,” said E. Simokaitis.
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The committee members approved the municipality’s position.
Intentional bankruptcy
There are about 300 apartments in the building at Birutės Street 22.
“Plienas”, which operated since the 1990s in Klaipėda, started building the Gandrališkės residential quarter in 2005, but before its completion, the global economic crisis began, which caused a sharp drop in housing demand and prices.
According to data from the Centre of Registers, in 2008, “Plienas” still received 13.3 million euros (45.9 million litas) in revenue and earned 1.9 million euros (6.5 million litas) in net profit, while in 2009, revenues fell to 4.8 million euros (16.7 million litas) and it incurred a loss of 2 million euros (7 million litas).
Later, things started to get even worse. In 2011, an attempt was made to restructure “Plienas”, and in early 2020, the Klaipėda Regional Court initiated bankruptcy proceedings against it, recognizing in mid-2022 that the company’s managers had intentionally led it to insolvency.
Gediminas Bartkevičius, who controlled 65% of “Plienas” shares, managed the company from its establishment in 1999 until its bankruptcy, and his spouse Banga Bartkevičienė held 35% of the shares.
In one of the cases concerning the company’s debts, the courts found that the shareholders managed “Plienas” by deliberately making unfair and economically disadvantageous decisions, thus leading the company to bankruptcy, which was recognized as intentional.
Currently, the company is being liquidated due to bankruptcy. According to 2023 data, “Plienas”‘s debts amounted to 15.3 million euros, of which 8.6 million euros were owed to SEB bank, which is the first in the line of creditors, and among other creditors, the largest claim – 4.8 million euros – was held by Vakarų pramonės ir finansų korporacija, managed by port city businessman Antanas Bosas, with whom the Gandrališkės quarter was developed.
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The company also owed more than 0.5 million euros to the state.
