The mayor of Moscow has called for the city's many gambling venues to be transformed into non other than libraries.
Mayor Yury Luzhkov intends to transform the casinos into libraries in order to raise dropping reading rates in Moscow. According to Luzhkov, more than 2,000 casinos opened in recently in Moscow and they are now making sure that they close down. The best thing to do with them, he said, is to turn them into book clubs.
Under new legislation by the Russian government, many of the casinos in Russian cities are to be shut down and relocated to four major zones around the country, in which gambling will be legal.
A city official said half of the residents of Moscow no longer buy books and 40 percent did not read books at all. Among other efforts to increase reading rates in moscow, which used to be very high in Soviet times, are giving away books to new parents and opening more bookshops and libraries.
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