By Andrew Atkinson
Pilar de la Horadada Council is leading one of the first projects to legalise illegal housing, part of the LOTUP (Law on Land Management, Urbanism and Landscape) reform, which allows the legalisation of houses on rustic land.
“The owners need to act now because they are going to have an opportunity that they may not be able to take advantage of later.
“I believe that once this is done, the Generalitat will draw a line after which they will not consent to even one more illegal home,” said a Council spokesperson.
“You have to appreciate that residents pay IBI and urbanisation costs,” they added.
The Council will present a rural plan that ensures the LOTUP protects the 140 houses in Pinar de la Perdiz, that are without drinking water or roads.
Pinar de la Perdiz residential area was constructed in the 1980s, under the guarantee of the owners being able to build on plots of 5,000 square metres.
It has a non-potable (drinking) water supply from the Casablanca well, located in the Murcia Region but it does not have urbanised roads. The residential area, with 250 plots, has approximately 140 houses built, that are set in the heart of the Sierra Escalona on Protected Landscape soil to the north-west of Campoverde.
Councillor Ángel Albaladejo (PP) said that all of the homes will have to prove that they were finished before August 20, 2014, with the potential outcome of becoming legalised.
Municipal technicians say that it is necessary to guarantee Emergency Services, and that fire, health and police, must be able to access each of the houses. Something that is not possible at present.
Illegal houses built in recent years have seen demolitions undertaken across the whole of the country.
