A few months before the elections and when he already has dozens of open lawsuits with the Cabildo and a hotel, the Papagayo Arena, in the process of being expropriated to be demolished, the mayor of Yaiza has launched into the most ...
A few months before the elections and when he already has dozens of open lawsuits with the Cabildo and a hotel, the Papagayo Arena, in the process of being expropriated to be demolished, the mayor of Yaiza has launched into the most difficult yet, authorizing the construction of a residential complex in Playa Blanca with capacity for almost as many inhabitants as the entire town of Tinajo.
Since the first Corporation of the island, they feared that something like this could happen and, precisely for that reason, last November they approved in plenary session the precautionary halt of all partial plans, to prevent the town councils from authorizing new residential beds while the Special Territorial Plan was being processed.
But that urban suspension, like the Island Territorial Planning Plan, is not enough to stop José Francisco Reyes.
In fact, once again he has ignored all the urban regulations established for the island and, above all, he has once again ignored the Cabildo, insisting on his philosophy that the institution that represents all the people of Lanzarote has no part in the development of Yaiza. And although there are already firm judicial rulings that oblige him to inform the Cabildo of all the licenses he grants, José Francisco Reyes has once again overlooked this small detail.
And although this is not new for either the first Corporation or the Courts, which on several occasions have had to urge him to hand over the licenses, this time Reyes has outdone himself, because the granting of this new license in Playa Blanca, granted last December, represents the greatest challenge to urban legality that has been made on the island in recent years, at least since the approval of the moratorium.
And it is that no matter how much the southern City Council insists on going it alone, and continue to affirm that neither the PIOT, nor the moratorium, nor the suspension of the partial plans have legal validity, and maintain lawsuits against all these urban tools, the truth is that to date it is the regulations that exist, and not even Reyes himself should put it on as a hat. In fact, if the mayor and the technicians of the south are so convinced that they can order the municipality as they please, and that they have an unlimited license to build, what is not understood is the secrecy with which they are carrying out this operation again.
Because even leaving aside all the laws and regulations that have been approved on this island to try to preserve the territory and stop excessive construction, the truth is that an operation of this caliber, which implies authorizing in one fell swoop, without a partial plan or anything like it, a work to build more than 1000 homes and 220 commercial premises, cannot be processed "secretly", as if it were a private business between the mayor and the developer.
Such an action, in addition to scrupulous compliance with current legislation, requires maximum transparency and certainly requires maximum intervention from the possible administrations involved, because it is an operation that if it remains "in the dark", especially with what is happening throughout Spain with issues related to urban planning, transmits everything but confidence.
And if José Francisco Reyes is really convinced that Playa Blanca should become a small Hong Kong and suddenly add another four thousand inhabitants, in an area that is not classified as developable land and that is not even prepared to house homes, the least he should do is explain it publicly, and not authorize it in silence as if the higher institutions, the citizens of the island and even his own voters had nothing to do with this story. And even less, when the legislature is about to come to an end and could be mortgaging not only the future of Playa Blanca, but that of the next City Council and that of the entire island.
