The state will earn at least 56 million kuna from legalization

Croatian citizens have submitted an incredible 773,198 applications for the legalization of illegally constructed buildings.

The highest number of applications was submitted in Zagreb – 88,000. This is followed by the Split-Dalmatia County, where 76,782 applications were submitted, and Zadar County with 62,445 received applications.

On the other hand, the least applications were received in Virovitica-Podravina County – 9,461 applications. Interestingly, more than half a million applications arrived in the last month, specifically in June.

The number of submitted applications is an absolute surprise for all those involved in the legalization process, as it was expected that around 100,000 to 300,000 applications would be submitted when the law on the handling of illegally constructed buildings was enacted and at the beginning of its implementation, said Minister of Construction and Spatial Planning Anka Mrak Taritaš.

The final number of applications will not change significantly; there will be an increase of several hundred applications that were, for example, submitted in Zagreb but relate to a building in another city or were submitted directly to the Ministry, rather than to the competent regional office.

To ensure that the applications are processed as quickly as possible, the minister announced that in the next two weeks she will visit all county and city mayors to see if all regional offices have enough staff and space for this and where assistance from the Ministry is needed, which will form teams of temporarily employed officials for this purpose, depending on the needs.

It is expected that about 10 percent of the submitted applications will be rejected because legalization is not possible under the law, and another 10 percent of applications were likely submitted out of fear, rather than because legalization was necessary, said Mrak Taritaš, adding that she hopes that within two years the majority, 70 to 80 percent of submitted applications, will be resolved.

Those who have not submitted an application, and their building is in an area where legalization is not possible, will have their building demolished. If legalization was possible, and it does not begin even after two penalties from the construction inspection, a demolition order will be issued. Since the beginning of this year, 417 buildings have already been removed.

Mrak Taritaš also emphasized that the priority remains the resolution of “normal” building permits for projects that are starting to be built or are under construction, and she reminded that applications for legalization must be processed in the order they are submitted.

In parallel with the processing of applications, the ministry will also begin analyzing them to see how many applications relate to illegal buildings, how many to reconstructions and extensions, or the legalization of auxiliary buildings, garages, enclosed balconies, etc.

Additionally, in the fall, the ministry will order a survey of the entire country to obtain a realistic state of the space and compare it with the data from the applications, thus assessing, for example, why some counties have significantly fewer applications than others, what has remained outside this process, etc. At that time, the development of space remediation projects and amendments to spatial plans will also begin, announced Mrak Taritaš.

In response to a journalist’s inquiry about the financial benefit to the state from the legalization process, Mrak Taritaš stated that the only direct benefit is from the collection of stamps at 70 kuna per application, totaling around 56 million kuna, and this should be added to the taxes paid by architects and geodesists who prepared the documents for legalization and issued invoices for that.

The money from legalization will be returned to the space, that is, it will be used for space remediation and small communal projects, such as road asphalting, public lighting installation, etc., thus employing builders and other contractors, and all of this is a benefit for the state, said Mrak Taritaš.