"The ruling makes it manifestly clear that the institution took the correct steps, carried out the appropriate procedures and presented the required preliminary project to request authorization to build a workshop intended to carry out artistic practices." That is the first assessment of the César Manrique Foundation after learning of the ruling of the Superior Court of Justice of the Canary Islands, which annuls the resolution of the Urban Planning Directorate of the Government of the Canary Islands that authorized the works in the Casa de las Cúpulas. In addition, the FCM holds the Administration responsible for incurring "inconsistency in view of the request or instance and the accompanying documentation", ending the procedure with authorization of "adaptation of housing as a workshop and exhibition space".
In any case, the Foundation insists that "the works carried out, intended to fulfill a strictly cultural and public interest purpose, have been developed at all times under the coverage of the appropriate authorization and license, issued in due course by the competent administrations", and emphasizes that "the ruling recognizes, and reiterates insistently, that the authorization of the General Directorate of Urban Planning was granted based on the preliminary project that defined the new construction work and that coincides, in essence, with the work executed
and already finished".
In this way, those responsible for the César Manrique Foundation consider that "the court's ruling does not derive any irregularity committed by the FCM, but rather the arguments put forward by the chamber that have led to annulling the authorization place all responsibility on the incorrect action of the Administration concerned." Therefore, they consider that "the Foundation unfairly becomes a victim of the deficient functioning of that administration, which has created an evident situation of legal uncertainty."
Regarding the actions they will undertake in the future, the FCM makes it clear that "even though it does not share the ruling, it abides by it and
announces that it will decline to appeal it in the appropriate instances", since it understands that "once the chamber has ruled and read the tenor of its pronouncement, it is up to the regional Administration to defend its actions and undertake the actions that may be necessary to restore urban legality, since the Administration, as the court recognizes, is solely responsible for those acts that have resulted in the aforementioned annulment."
In this sense, they announce that "following its line of demanding compliance with environmental and urban legality, it will urge the provisional execution of the ruling." Furthermore, and although the pronouncement urges the "retraction of the procedure to the moment of the initial authorization request", that is, to restart the procedures
to obtain the pertinent authorization again, "the FCM will not take any initiative in that sense, considering that the responsibility for correcting the deficiencies found by the Court, and which have led to the nullity of the authorization, corresponds exclusively to the autonomous Administration."
What the Foundation is willing to do is demand that it be restored "the damage that has been caused to it" and anticipates that "at the precise moment, it will exercise its right to raise, through the appropriate channel, the appropriate claim for damages to the administrations concerned, both for the possible damage caused to the public image of the Foundation and for the economic damage derived from a possible inviability of the permanence of the workshop."
