 Since 1981 - on party work in the city of Gorky.From 1983 to 1987 he worked as an instructor, deputy head of the Organizational-Party Work Department of the CPSU Central Committee.From 1987 to 1988 - the second, from 1988 to 1991 - the first secretary of the Gorky Regional Committee of the CPSU, simultaneously from April 1990 and until August 1991 - chairman of the Gorky (Nizhny Novgorod) Regional Council people's deputies.