Despite having the support of the PSC tied up, the Government has not yet guaranteed the 2024 budgets. It needs the commons to facilitate them. Comú Podem has warned that they will not support them until the Government withdraws the urban master plan (PDU) of the Recreational and Tourist Center (CRT) of the Hard Rock in Vila-seca and Salou. But the Catalan Executive warns that it has little room for maneuver to paralyze it by its own decision and unilaterally if it is not assuming millionaire economic compensation for patrimonial liability.
Patrimonial liability means the obligation of public administrations to repair the damage caused. Damages that include compensation, for example, for architectural and urban projects that Hard Rock may have commissioned, for the cost of lawyers, for travel, etc. Economic damages would also include consequential damages, that is, the entire business perspective that the private company estimates has been hindered by the action of the public administration.
In the project in Vila-seca and Salou there are three actors involved: CriteriaCaixa –owner of the land–, Hard Rock –the investment company– and the Institut Català del Sòl or Incasòl, which depends on the Generalitat and acts as an intermediary. There is no clause by which the Generalitat has to compensate CriteriaCaixa or Hard Rock. Neither between the two private companies, nor even any obligation on their part to carry out the operation. Therefore, it would not be strange if the 120 million agreed in 2020 for the purchase of the land were renegotiated. Despite everything, patrimonial responsibility is on the table.
In any case, it is not an automated procedure. Demand that the injured company, Hard Rock, claim this responsibility. You can do it, since the Generalitat, for example, granted you in 2018 the license and authorization for the installation and operation of a casino in the CRT that, with the betting rooms, would occupy 30,000 square meters.
The PDU was approved in 2016. In 2020, the judges declared it partially null as a result of an administrative dispute promoted by the Group for the Study and Protection of Catalan Ecosystems - Ecologists of Catalonia (Gepec), noting that "the bulk of the open spaces and public facilities of Sector 1 are located in an area at risk of serious accidents from the chemical industry”.
Now, after dozens of reports, one from the environment is pending, the last one remaining. In 2022, Acció Climàtica has already issued an unfavorable one. The PDU was modified again and is now awaiting this new report that the Government recognizes is about to fall. However, another unfavorable consideration would not stop the project either, since resolution measures, suggestions and compensations to be studied are always included.
Is there an option for the project to be stopped without assuming financial costs? The least harmful option would be for the multinational to resign. According to the Government, Hard Rock, although the recreational complex should have seen the light of day years ago, is still interested. But the company tells the Catalan Executive that right now it does not have the necessary financing. It will only be launched if the PDU is approved.
Finally, if it goes ahead, no one is unaware that new administrative disputes will be filed before the courts against the project. And that there will be a certain response in the street.
Be that as it may, due to all these last factors in the Government – which does not view the complex favorably – there is the conviction that it is difficult for Hard Rock to crystallize.
