Members of the Russian Judiciary Visit Plymouth County Registry of Deeds
On Wednesday, September 17, 2008, the Plymouth County Registry of Deeds hosted members of the Russian Judiciary from the Tomsk Region of the Russian Federation. The Tomsk Oblate (region) is located in the southeast area of the West Siberian Plain.
The main city in the region, Tomsk, is a city of approximately 500,000 people and was founded in 1604. Tomsk is the administrative and legal center of the province. It was designated a special economic zone by the Russian Federation in 2005.
Tomsk is said to have an atmosphere very much like Boston when colleges are in session. There are six universities and 90,000 students. Almost one fifth of their population is students.
Chairman of the Registry’s display committee, Tony Markella, guided the Russian officials and their translators through the Registry’s front entrance displays highlighting the history of Plymouth Colony and the founding of the Registry of Deeds. The tour was a timely precursor to the delegation’s next scheduled stop, Plimoth Plantation.
A tour of the functional operations of the Registry ended in Land Court, where department head Lucille Plausse discussed Massachusetts’ land registration system. The Russian Federation has been advancing ownership and record keeping of private property ownership since the mid-1990’s. Their system of recording relates very closely to our Land Court. In addition, according to a recent Ernst and Young economic report, the Russia Federation recently adopted changes to their system of recording in order to create an upgraded unified system stored on electronic media by the year 2012.
A Russian delegation hosted by then Register Jack Riordan visited the Plymouth County Registry at its former Russell Street location in the early 90’s. The Norfolk County Registry of Deeds also hosted a Russian delegation within the last few years.
The visit was conducted through the Open World Program, whose website describes the program’s objective as building mutual understanding between the United States and Russia by opening and maintaining new avenues of dialogue between U.S. political and civic leaders and a new generation of Russian leaders. The visit to the Plymouth County Registry was coordinated through the Massachusetts Land Court.
