It issued 47 permits for diversion-type small hydropower plants on Stara Planina, which would have put some 42 kilometres of streams into pipes, then introduced a moratorium in 2019 and in 2021 adopted a spatial plan without small hydropower plants. RERI filed criminal complaints against the mayor and the head of the city administration on suspicion that they unlawfully granted the investor in one plant passage through public property; no proceedings have been opened.