The prime minister arrived in the Black Sea city of Sochi on Wednesday to check on preparations for the 2014 Winter Olympics. As part of his visit, Putin inspected housing being built for the evicted Imeretinskaya residents – approximately one thousand families coming from 628 houses and 369 apartments.

The residents have been protesting the unfair conditions of their eviction for years, holding demonstrations, hunger strikes, and filing suits with the European Court of Human Rights. The complaints range from the unlawful basis of the evictions to unfair compensation for their confiscated property.

At the same time, Prime Minister Putin has assured officials from the International Olympic Committee that the evicted residents are content with their new housing.

“The people are satisfied. I have to speak honestly: many of these people didn’t live in these conditions earlier,” said the prime minister. The new housing plans by Olympstroy, the state corporation responsible for Olympic construction, provide for 526 houses and several apartment buildings.

The evicted Imeretinskaya Valley residents were given the choice to take either the new housing or monetary compensation equal to the value of their property. If the new housing is worth less than a family’s previous property, then it is also entitled to additional compensation.

However, many residents say that the Olympstroy housing – located in mountainous villages near airport radars – is simply unacceptable compared to their own, high-quality homes closer to the sea. Moreover, many say that the monetary compensation they’re receiving is far below the actual market value they should be getting.

Despite these ongoing issues, the Russian authorities have told Olympic officials that the problems surrounding the eviction of the Imeretinskaya residents have already been resolved.

Construction for the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi includes plans for 13 new or reconstructed sports facilities, 4 ski resorts with tracks more than 150 kilometers in length, 8 kilometers of ski lifts, and more than 100 hotels with 27,000 rooms.

The Russian authorities have been severely criticized by not only evicted residents, but by ecologists, geologists, human rights organizations, oppositionists, and numerous other experts for a host of problems ranging from unprecedented damage to Sochi’s unique natural environment to rights abuses against construction workers. Ecologists note with particular concern that parts of the Caucasian State Nature Biosphere Reserve, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, has already undergone irreparable damage.

Speaking to the BBC, Volkov said that construction of major Olympic facilities in Sochi is being done “too hastily, without a proper system for the engineering research that would be appropriate for these environmental dangers.”

Numerous ecologists have been voicing concerns for years already that Olympic construction in Sochi will lead to irreparable damage of one of the world’s most unique biospheres. In February, the Russian bureau of the World Wildlife Foundation issued a scathing press release slamming Olympstroy’s failure to heed objections and warnings made by their ecologists, and decrying preparations for the games as “out of control.” Meanwhile, residents have complained of forced evictions to make way for new facilities, and some unpaid workers have staged hunger strikes to draw attention to their plight.

But as a geologist, Dr. Volkov is primarily concerned about plans for a combination road and railway that will link the coastal center of the city of Sochi with the mountains in Krasnaya Polyana, where most of the Olympic events are planned to take place. When then-President Vladimir Putin won the bid in 2007 to hold the games in Sochi, only a very rudimentary roadway connected these two areas. With its $8 billion price tag, the new one is the most expensive Olympic project of all, and Volkov argues that its construction could lead to a series of geological disasters.

“It’s a potentially dangerous area,” said the geologist, writing an open letter to Russian President Dmitri Medvedev from his hiding place in Ukraine. “There have been big landslides in the past and there are large deposits of mercury, uranium and other potentially dangerous minerals. But all scientific advice is being ignored.”

Dr. Volkov also says that he has repeatedly appealed to regional authorities in the Southern Federal District as well as Olympstroy management, but to no avail.

Speaking to the BBC – which notably happened upon an active landslide in the Krasnaya Polyana mountains during its research on this report – Krasnaya Polyana Mayor Sergei Avdeev said that he shared Dr. Volkov’s concerns. “When the International Olympic Committee awarded the games to Russia, they knew full well that Russia did not have enough time to do proper research and build all the facilities in line with international environmental and construction standards,” he said. “I pray to God that there will not be any consequences. The only thing we can do is pray and hope.”

A video report on Dr. Volkov by the BBC can be found by clicking here, and a photo gallery by clicking here.

Garry Kasparov, the leader of the United Civil Front party, noted that what is currently happening in the region does not correspond to the original plan as it was presented in Guatemala. Several planned construction sites are currently unbuildable, after geodesic surveys discovered underground problems. Panelists named the Imeretinsky Bukhta, which has an exceptionally high water table, with groundwater just two meters beneath the surface of the soil, and where “15-20 meter-long pilings drown.”

“There are things that cannot be done, even if a billion dollars is buried into them,” Kasparov said.

Another concern raised by the panelists was the unprecedented level of spending required to pull the Olympic games together, which Kasparov said is “beating all the records.” Sochi lacks much of the infrastructure of previous Olympic locations, and the original expense prediction of 6 billion dollars is shockingly low. Ivan Starikov of the People for Democracy and Justice party, commented that the current estimate for transportation infrastructure alone was now set at 7 billion dollars. Other cities beaten out by Sochi for the bid to host the games could take the IOC to court, Starikov said, as total cost was a factor in making the original decision.

One Russian Member of Parliament, Viktor Ilyukhin, told the press on April 3rd that the Sochi Olympics could cost more than the last three winter Olympic games combined.

Greenpeace, the international ecological watchdog, may also take the IOC to court. Dmitri Kaptsov, a representative of the “North Caucasus Ecological Watch,” said that Greenpeace is planning to protest the lack of environmental planning before construction, arguing that leading the Olympics in Sochi would cause a regional eco-catastrophe. To date, no expert reports on construction or ecological matters have been completed.

Sochi residents were also present at the conference to speak about the thousands of families facing eviction in the Black Sea resort. Residents complained that government officials were seizing land without providing adequate compensation or equally valued housing. Panelists also called unconstitutional a so-called “Olympic law,” which expedites the process of taking resident’s homes, and bars locals from seeking judicial protection for their property.

The press-conference reached a troubling conclusion, that Olympic planners in Sochi were using the Games as a means to attain personal wealth at the expense of local citizens and Russian taxpayers.

“It must be stated, that the present course will lead to the destruction of a unique Black Sea resort, the massive violation of Russian citizens’ civil rights, [and] the misuse of funds earmarked for the games,” a statement by participants reads. “It will damage Russia’s image, and ultimately, will put even the possibility of leading the Olympic games in Sochi into question.”

As Kaptsov explained, the IOC has the right to move the Olympics to a different city in the case that the country hosting the games does not meet its obligations. As an example, the presenters noted the 1976 Olympics, which were moved from Denver in the United States to Montreal in Canada.

The press-conference did suggests a way to ameliorate the state of affairs in Sochi. They proposed enacting a strict citizen’s control of the preparations, and suggested the possibility of moving some of the major Olympic facilities to other Russian regions that are more suited to hosting the winter Olympics. A Citizen’s Council with the obligation of overseeing the preparations in Sochi is currently in the works.