Regional town planning director gets 'the grill’
WE had the chance last week to grill the regional director general of town planning, Vicente García Nebot, about anything we wanted and that’s exactly what we did.
As you would expect my focus was MIT licences for unlicensed/illegal properties built on rural land. Some really important answers were given, most of which are good news and a couple of which I’m going to endeavour to change.
Let’s start with the good news; it was made clear that the use of ECUVs, those are the private entities which are now empowered to issue the technical approval for projects, including MIT licences, is by default. If a town hall doesn’t want ECUVs to be used in their municipality they have to expressly object to it to the Generalitat, the regional government. That’s great news as it means you can completely skip the municipal technician who in some cases has a backlog of up to a few years. No waiting. Incidentally, having been a municipal technician this is also great news for them, especially those working in villages affected by unlicensed rural properties, which is most of the 542 municipalities in the Valencia region. Imagine, if you already have a two-year backlog and an avalanche (which is what I’m hoping it will be) of MIT license requests arrive the system would just collapse even further.
By the way, on the 13th of this month at 11.00 we have a MIT presentation in the village of Lliber, you’re invited, and we have also invited EQA, an ECUV to explain what they do and answer any questions you may have.
More good news, there was some confusion about the calculation of the construction density/ the plot size, you need to make an individual declaration (DSI). It is now clear that in drawing up the area to be included in an application the land included does not have to belong to the person making the application.
Let me clarify, the MIT licence is for a specific property but, the area used to make the density calculation could include your plot, the road, a bit of someone else’s plot, so long as it’s attached to your plot. So it’s much easier to meet the criteria for the DSI/ individual procedure which is the simplest/ fastest and cheapest.
On the same subject, construction density, it was also made clear that the data given in the guide to MIT (p30) is correct despite an apparent conflict with that stated in the LOTUP 2019. There is an option to follow the DSI procedure, for construction densities of up to and including nine properties per hectare. That’s a huge plus, it means that even without including land that doesn’t belong to you (roads etc.) you only need everyone in that hectare to have a plot of just over 1,100m2, instead of the 5,000m2 or 10,000m2 as stated in the LOTUP.
These might sound trivial clarifications but, they are huge. If you have a property that can now follow the DSI procedure as opposed to the collective one to legalise your property this is great and momentous news. Here’s the kicker, that construction density criteria choice, is in the hands of your local town hall. If they want to they can apply the much more restrictive LOTUP criteria of max two properties per hectare, or they apply those given in the orientation guide. It’s up to you make sure your wishes
are taken into account by your council, make yourself heard.
My discussions with the mayor of Ondara, Jose Ramiro, about their strategy of DSI procedure by default was raised. Let me be clear, I absolutely concur that this is the most effective way to apply the MIT licences. Happily, the director general also believes this is the case. That means your council could do the same.
Horror stories have already come to our attention about property owners being charged up to €7,000 for just the first phase of the application process. The first phase is a doddle, basically it’s filling out an application form, attaching a sectorial impact report, which sounds like anything but, a doddle but, it really it’s less intellectually challenging than making a cup of coffee.
I made a video of how to do it (view it via the QR code on the right) but if you don’t fancy doing it yourself don’t worry,
send your catastral reference number to the paper and I’ll send you the report free of charge in a pdf (email djones@cbnews.es)
So, I asked the director general what we could do to stop possible abuses. His answer was “Nothing, it’s a free market”. He’s right but, I hope by showing you that despite the highly technical sounding names this procedure is super simple, by design and don’t let anyone tell you it isn’t.
We have an interview with Manolo Civera, the director general of the AVPT, the new agency created to control what is built on rural land this week. They have developed a new tool – El Localizador – which allows people just to put in the catastral number for their property and out will pop an analysis of their legal status and their eligibility for MIT.
It’s working, it’s being tweaked so that no-one is given false information but, according to the director general, it will be on-line in the next few weeks.
That’s going to make life a whole lot easier. Put in a number get your status in return.
For the second time, I requested that the costs of the technical project for those affected by Lliber, who bought in good faith and with a municipal licence in their hand, be covered by the public administration. That request was rejected. I will keep requesting it at every opportunity.
More news to come after our meeting with the AVPT.
Have a great week!