The mayor, arrested.

I am slow in writing this post, which is odd because it is one of the most exciting blog posts we've gotten to write so far about our life in Romania.

Two weeks ago, the mayor of Lupeni was arrested.

This is really good news.

Ever since Romania joined the European Union in 2008, they have been making slow strides towards European economic and civic norms, one of the most challenging being in the area of corruption.  But in recent years the anti-corruption unit, called the DNA, has been slowly gaining power and arresting people that our friends have told us "they never thought would get caught."  The election of Klaus Iohannis as president of Romania was a huge step and symbol of progress too, which also made us giddy with hope.  But now -- now! -- it's come here to Lupeni, and I am so pumped.

There are all sorts of stories about Cornel Resmeriţa, the man who has been mayor of Lupeni for 10 years.  I remember walking to school with my host sister and host mom as a student here in the fall of 2010 and passing the construction of a beautiful house on Straja Road.  I was a bit puzzled by the situation, as I hadn't seen many other construction projects in Lupeni moving along very quickly, so I asked my host mom about it.  "Oh, it's the mayor's," she said, sighing.  "He steals material from some of the public construction projects of apartment buildings to speed up the process."  I was askance.  "It's his fifth house," she added, shaking her head and walking on, while I scraped my jaw off the floor.

Whether or not that anecdote is true (admittedly, I haven't fact-checked it), there are plenty of other stories which seem to corroborate it.  An IMPACT project to sterilize Lupeni's street dogs, taken over and ended by the mayor.  Bags of food given to poor people in exchange for a vote at election time.  Free barbeques and concerts in the park by national artists, conveniently timed for only once every few years during his re-election campaign or the campaigns of other members of his party.  A bankrupt city hall, while the mayor and his cronies go on a weekend "retreat" to London.  The stories go on and on and on.

And yet, last Monday, we came to the office and heard the news -- he'd been taken into custody by the DNA.  They stormed his house in riot gear, searched it for incriminating documents, and put Resmeriţa in a van headed for Bucharest.  Apparently it's part of a nation-wide sting based on a huge corruption scandal going all the way up to the Ministry of Tourism; Resmeriţa's part has something to do with preferential contracts for the electrification of the Straja ski village.  He's since been released to house arrest and is back in Lupeni awaiting trial, but the trial is coming.

And hopefully after that, some change for a community that really needs it.

Thanks be to God.