Gallifa, Planoles, Ribes de Fresser and Josa i Tuixent are the only municipalities that have completed the rehabilitation of housing in the rural world planned in the pilot plan promoted by the Agència de l'Habitatge de Catalunya (AHC) in 2020. Of the 20 selected localities, four renounced the subsidy initially; two have not yet started construction, so the AHC understands that they would also have rejected the aid; Ten are still in the “partial or total” execution phase of the works, and the aforementioned four have completed them, according to the data provided by the Department of Territory of the Generalitat.
The mayors of towns with less than 1,000 inhabitants who are fighting against depopulation insist that the lack of housing is one of the main obstacles to retaining young people who want to emancipate themselves and to attracting new neighbors. This deficit was what pushed the Generalitat to promote the Habitat Promotion Program in the Món Rural (PPHMR) in 2020, endowed with two million euros, to encourage the recovery of properties in poor condition and try to stop the population decline.
One of the reasons for the limited success of the PPHMR is that the municipalities to which it was directed have limited capacity for maneuver, few staff and insufficient resources to adapt to the requirements set out in the call. The local world implores to make urban planning regulations more flexible to enable the adaptation of different types of properties to primary residences, a demand that they anticipate will be met in the future Estatut dels Municipios Rurals.
Riner, in Solsonès, one of the selected towns, had to give up the first change. “We wanted to build a home in a sports facility, we understood that redistributing the space was possible, but we came up against very strict regulations, we had to modify the POUM, something that would take at least a year, and we only have a municipal technician one day a day. week, it was unfeasible for us to be able to carry out the process,” laments the mayor, Joan Solà, who also presides over the Associació de Micropobles de Catalunya.
The fact that only four towns have been able to complete the rehabilitation of houses shows “that, in the end, the bureaucracy to which each project must be submitted makes everything drag on and we end up giving up,” he comments.
Solà adds that they "constantly receive requests from both young people here and from people from outside to rent a home in Riner."
Almatret, in Segrià, also had to abandon the pilot plan because the help from the Generalitat was not enough to update the housing that the City Council had acquired, indicates councilor Jordi Tarragó, mayor in the previous term. Almatret has been able to renovate two apartments with the help of the Lleida Provincial Council. “Now we have requests from several families to settle in Almatret; In 2024, we plan to have three houses finished and we will draw up the bases to proceed with the rental. The procedures are slow because we have few staff,” says Tarragó.
Gallifa is one of the four town councils that have completed their project, which has resulted in the arrival of two neighbors to this town in Vallès Oriental, a mother and her daughter, of school age, indicates the mayor, Mateu Comalrena. In this case, the owner of a property that he had inherited, and in which no one had lived for a long time, accessed, through the City Council, the PPHMR subsidy to finance 60% of the cost of the rehabilitation. The tenants have been residing in their new home for months now.
“The AHC has made a poor diagnosis of the housing problem in the rural world, which has caused this program to be inefficient and ineffective. It has been done with a very urban vision; For example, the amounts of the subsidies are low, it must be taken into account that the houses in the towns are usually large, in addition there were buildings in protected old towns that did not obtain authorization for renovations. He knows badly that, there being a demand for housing, when the Generalitat, which is a very slow administration, issues a call, the entire planned budget is not executed,” considers Comalrena.
Gallifa has rehabilitated two more houses and is in the process of finishing a third with help from the Barcelona Provincial Council.
Planoles, in Ripollès, has also been able to finish two apartments that will soon be rented at an affordable price, 375 and 390 euros per month. Families with minor children and young people between 22 and 35 years old who have been registered in the municipality for more than a year will be eligible. “It is a building in the center of town that was in poor condition, owned by neighbors who have invested 170,000 euros, and the Generalitat, 80,000,” explains the mayor, David Verge. It should be remembered that the subsidy was a maximum of 60% of the cost of the works, in the case of belonging to a private company, and 90%, if it was municipal.
“The main problem of the towns of the Pyrenees is the lack of housing; In Planoles, 72% of the residential park is second homes, but since we have fiber optics, there are beginning to be vacationers who telework and extend their weekends here; There are also people who retire who stay to live,” he adds. Verge believes that if urban planning procedures were faster, there would be more opportunities to recover disused buildings and build apartments. “The bureaucracy is a drama, it would be necessary for housing powers to be transferred to the regional councils to speed up the process,” emphasizes the mayor.
The conditions for access to the PPHMR, which is aimed at municipalities with a maximum of 500 inhabitants, or those with less than 3,000, in the case of those with more than ten population centers, were published in December 2020. The deadline of execution of the works from the presentation of the project is 18 months, but town councils can request an extension.
The Department of Territory indicates that they will not analyze the operation of the plan until its validity period ends, which is four years, as they point out. A year ago, the ACH issued a second call in which 25 town councils were admitted, although the same sources respond that they only have evidence that three works have started, in Arnes, Les Lloses and Biosca.
