NEWS OF URBAN OR RUSTIC PLANNING LEGALISATION
The Consell de Govern from the Balearic island approves the Decree-Law on administrative simplification and rationalization.
In this rule there are some extraordinary regularization and legalisations of out-of-order constructions The Omnibus Decree provides that the buildings, constructions, installations and uses out of order, for which at the entry into force of this Decree Law it is no longer appropriate to adopt measures to restore urban planning legality, may be legalised on an extraordinary basis within a maximum period of three years.
This measure is only aimed at buildings and constructions against which the Administration can no longer act, because they are time-barred infringements, against which it is no longer possible to impose a sanction or to restore urban planning legality.
The measure incorporates the prohibition to use it for the commercialisation of tourist stays. Those buildings, constructions and installations built eight years before the entry into force of the Decree-Law will be eligible for this extraordinary measure. In the case of buildings, constructions and installations located on protected rural land, they will be those built before the entry into force of the Land Use and Planning Act of 29 May 2014, except on land included in the scope of the Natural Spaces Law, where they must be prior to 10 March 1991. For this reason, the measure is adopted in exchange for requiring owners to pay financial compensation and to adopt environmental measures.
Thus, they will be obliged to contribute, like other owners, to the urban planning procedure by paying the same fees and taxes as for new buildings, constructions or installations. The interested party will have to pay a financial benefit at the town hall. The amounts paid in this way must be used for the acquisition, recovery, protection and sustainable management of natural spaces and resources or for the endowment of the municipal land patrimony.
Therefore, a percentage of 10 % will be applied if the legalisation is requested in the first year of this procedure, 12.5 % if it is requested in the second year and 15 % if it is requested in the third year, with a reduction of 50 % for applicants subject to personal income tax, in the case of taxpayers whose total taxable income, calculated on the average of the last four tax years, does not exceed 33. 33,000 in the case of individual taxation or 52,800 euros in the case of joint taxation; and 25 % when this base does not exceed 52,800 euros in the case of individual taxation or 84,480 euros in the case of joint taxation.
In addition, a technical project will have to be submitted for the adaptation to environmental sustainability criteria with measures involving a reduction in light pollution and an increase in the energy or water efficiency of the building, construction or installation through the use of materials, techniques and construction systems, change of installations, generation of renewable energy, installation of water tanks or any other system to reduce energy or water consumption of the network, and also water purification systems appropriate in each case in the Hydrological Plan of the Balearic Islands.
The extraordinary procedure regulated in this additional provision is NOT applicable to the following cases:
- Buildings, constructions or installations which, in accordance with the planning in force, are subject to expropriation, compulsory and free transfer or demolition.
- Buildings, constructions or installations located in the public domain, in the protection zone of roads or in the easements derived from coastal legislation.
- Buildings, constructions, installations and uses that imply the exercise of an activity for which, in accordance with the sectorial legislation in force, the acquisition of places, quotas or other rights of a public and limited nature is required, as in the case of rural hotels or agrotourism.
- Buildings, constructions or installations in which activities are carried out that are subject to the prior declaration of general interest referred to in Law 6/1997, of 8 July, on rural land in the Balearic Islands, when the activity in question in each case is not declared to be of general interest in accordance with article 26 of the aforementioned Law.
The resolution by virtue of which the extraordinary legalisation licence for a dwelling is granted, if applicable, will have to expressly state the prohibition to use it for the commercialisation of tourist stays. In addition, the requirement for a certificate of habitability of first occupation, which is issued by the island councils, is eliminated, and the municipal licence of first occupation is left as the basis, given that there was an obvious duplication.
The licences can also be outsourced to the ECU. In any case, the text or this rules still needs to be published in the BOIB for it to be legally valid and effective.