Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1141804
8 maltatoday | SUNDAY • 14 JULY 2019 NEWS JAMES DEBONO THE Planning Authority has been very busy issuing permits and receiving an average of 11 reports every day of ille- galities from the public. But it's 'build now, sanction later' mentality continues to prevail, as in 541 cases of illegalities reported in 2018, the perpetrators opted to present a sanc- tioning application Malta's planning regulator has 7,000 pending enforcements At the end of 2018, the pending case- load of stop-and-enforcement notices issued, since 1993, stood at almost 7,000. Only 410 of these notices are subject to a daily fine. "This suggests that a more strategic approach is required to tackle the old pending cases since an administrative effort is not proving to be sufficient," the annual report states. Nonetheless, during 2018, 664 en- forcement cases were closed by the PA's planning directorate: 331 notices of which were closed after permission to sanction the illegal development was issued; 240 enforcement notices were closed since the illegal development was removed by the offender; whilst 52 cases were closed as a result of the re- moval of the illegalities through direct action by the Planning Directorate; and 41 cases were closed since the "sub- stance of the notices was superseded by events". Every day, the PA receives 11 reports flagging illegalities During 2018, the Planning Directorate received 2,560 planning complaints made by the public, which according to the report represented a decrease of approximately 15% from the previous year. But the Directorate also received an additional 1,572 complaints with re- gards to infringements of Construction Site Management Regulations during the summer months. According to the report "the enhance- ment of administrative channels and IT services ensured that the additional load of complaints was still expediently and effectively investigated." The Directorate also makes use of drones, especially in ODZ areas, to ac- cess remote areas. In addition, exten- sive use of tablets and smart-phones is made by the officers to access informa- tion remotely and resolve issues imme- diately. In this way a total of 4,721 complaints were investigated and closed off during 2018. The investigation resulted in the iden- tification of illegal development in ap- proximately half of the complaints re- ceived. These investigations required 6,178 recorded inspections by the Di- rectorate's officers. 541 applications to regularise illegalities flagged by public In a reflection of the prevailing 'build now and sanction later' mentality, in 541 of the cases investigated, the property owner 'resolved' the issue by merely submitting a sanctioning appli- cation to regularise the development. The directorate also issued 146 en- forcement notices as a result of the in- vestigation of complaints. "In relation to the rest of the cases, the contra- veners removed the illegalities them- selves before the initiation of enforce- ment action." The Directorate focused on illegal changes of use to residential or com- mercial cases outside development zones, the removal of dumped material causing injury to amenity, and illegal billboards. 9,413 compliance certificates, a considerable number issued without inspection Legal changes have been introduced to allow the issue of compliance cer- tificates, required for the provision of electricity to new developments, with- out the sites being actually inspected. This measure "was necessary to cope with the increased workload over the past few years," the report states. The procedures for the receipt, vetting and assessment of requests for compli- ance certificates were modified so as to "ensure consistency throughout, while relying more on the declaration of con- formity made by the warranted Periti". This led to a higher percentage of com- pliance certificates being issued with- out the requirement of a site inspection by officers. During 2018, the Planning Directorate received 9,413 requests for the issue of compliance certificates, which is a mar- ginal increase over the previous year. 2,500 construction sites inspected Nearly 2,500 construction sites were inspected in all the localities in Malta and Gozo, of which 1,570 sites were found to be non-compliant with Con- struction Site Management Regula- tions. The property owners were provided with the necessary guidance to ad- dress such issues within a specific time- frame. After a second round of inspec- tions carried out after fifteen days, 1,260 construction sites were found compli- ant with the minimum requirements. 310 sites remained non-compliant and stop notices were issued on these sites. Within the subsequent two weeks, 262 of these construction sites had become compliant with the instructions given by the Directorate's officers. Average of 33 applications received every day With a total of 12,173 planning appli- cations received, 2018 saw an increase of 7.7% on the previous year's record number of submissions. The number of new applications lo- cated in development zones and out- side urban conservation areas went up by 13%, from a monthly average of 465 in 2017, to a monthly average of 524 in 2018. In total, 6,291 applications were received in development zones out- side UCA areas, of which 59 percent were summary procedure applications, which apply to applications involving less than 16 new dwellings. This means that these applications re- quired a shorter consultation period of two weeks rather than three. Within Urban Conservation Areas the PA received an average of 180 new ap- plications per month. Six main take-aways from the Planning Authority's latest annual report 7,000 enforcements and counting…