The Yaiza City Council has announced this Wednesday that, from this moment, it suspends the granting of licenses and returns to operate with its 1973 urban planning plan, after the last appeals against the ruling that annulled its 2014 general plan have been rejected.
In a statement, the mayor of the town, Óscar Noda, explains that the Superior Court of Justice of the Canary Islands (TSJC) has just notified the City Council that it does not admit the appeals against that ruling filed by the Government of the Canary Islands, the City Council itself, and the company Club Lanzarote, the last ones pending.
"Once the Order is known, the Administration suspends the granting of licenses, having to apply the 1973 planning," he specifies.
The mayor points out that "the annulment of the plan (2014 general) was not desirable", because he considers that, "despite its flaws it has been a very useful document for the municipality".
"However, we have to abide by judicial decisions and act accordingly. We will continue tendering and executing works of general interest and we will study private requests considering the conditions we had before 2014," he details.
The City Council is already working on a new general plan
The City Council clarifies that it is already working on a new general plan and from which it expects to have a first draft to submit it in May to the opinion of the environmental body.
The TSJC rejected the latest appeals in defense of the 2014 general plan because it understands that "the defect found for the declaration of Nullity of the Plan is not rectifiable as the omission of a mandatory report is a cause of nullity by operation of law".
The Yaiza City Council recalls that "the 2022 ruling bases the annulment of the general plan on one of the 20 grounds for challenge argued by the plaintiff, the lack of a road report, dismissing the remaining nineteen".
The municipal government team believes "it is relevant that this same ruling dismissed the plaintiff's assertion that the plan concealed a kind of 'amnesty' for irregularities already judicially declared regarding partial plans and building and activity licenses for certain hotel and non-hotel tourist complexes".
"It is clear that the 2014 plan was not to legalize hotels, the proof is that we feel its usefulness as an urban planning tool for sports, educational facilities or the construction of homes for residents in the different localities. We have a great challenge ahead: to continue with the orderly development of our municipality," points out the mayor