In an apparent surprise to many in attendance, Deputy Prime Minister Armen Gevorgyan opened the next consecutive session of the Aragatzotn Regional Council. After rural community leaders presented a check list of the problems faced by area villagers, Mr. Gevorgyan responded, "Don’t make me cry." DPM Gevorgyan said that henceforth, local community leaders would be present during Regional Council sessions and that they would thus be given the opportunity to raise issues they face in their respective communities. This view was contrasted by the fact that none of the local leaders present at yesterday’s hearings rose to ask a question of Aragatzotn Regional Administrator Sargis Sahakyan. Instead, many of the rural community leaders posed a variety of questions at Mr. Gevorgyan, who is also the RoA Minister of Territorial Administration. Uppermost on their list of concerns is the fact that the amount of uncultivated land in the Marz is growing yearly. The community leaders said that this is due to the exorbitant land taxes that rural farmers cannot pay. Vardenis village mayor Kamo Petrosyan complained that the local school, built in the 1970’s, had never been repaired since and is now structurally unstable. "The drainage pipes are all backed up and sewage is collecting in the basement. Not to mention the fact that school children are turned off by the interior of the building rather than wanting to attend classes," he said. DPM Gevorgyan asked the village mayor if he had applied to the appropriate seismic testing unit in order to gauge just how dangerous the school was. The mayor answered that this was just his first year in office and that he hadn’t got around to it yet. Mr. Gevorgyan responded, "I congratulate you. You have three years left to do so." All the questions from the floor, raised by the local leaders, dealt with government financial assistance. This line of inquiry seemed to unnerve DPM Gevorgyan who declared, "If you are here to just ask about money, let me tell you that we have none. Don’t expect anything this year from the government. You have waited all these years to ask questions of me personally, but they could have been delivered to my office through operating channels." Wrapping up the session, DPM Gevoryan said that on the whole 2009 was a good year for Aragatzotn. He mentioned that the region’s 2009 gross agricultural output amounted to 46 billion AMD, a 2.7% increase over the previous year.