Cabinet Obstructs POS

Alenka Kocisa Cicin-Sain said today that the cabinet is obstructing the program of stimulated apartment construction.

HNS’s parliamentarian Alenka Kocisa Cicin-Sain said today that the cabinet is obstructing the program of stimulated apartment construction (POS) and is doing so in to the construction mafia’s benefit.

Kocisa Cicin-Sain reminded at a press conference in the Croatian parliament, that at the end of 2003 there were 10,649 POS apartments in circulation, at 139 locations.

Currently there are 5,699 POS apartments in circulation, however most of those projects were started by the previous government. The agency for real estate trade (APN) in the last three years has only found two locations for POS, in Kutina and Dugo Selo, with a total of 50 apartments, said Alenka Kocisa Cicin-Sain.

She uses that data as evidence that the cabinet is quietly obstructing POS, leaving construction to the free market, as she said, benefits the construction mafia which earns the difference in price per square meter.

Announcements of constructing new suburbs in Sopnica and Sesvete is considered to be a farce, because a detailed plan has not yet been prepared, and this term is nearly over.

She warned that the decision of the ministry to hand over the complete project documentation of POS in Zagreb to the city government has raised the price of an apartment from 910 to 1400 euros per square meter. She concluded that this is about a “political-financial coupling”.

Mentioning the cabinet’s proposition to change the law concerning POS, HNS’s member said that the price increase for POS land was acceptable, which will, she says, make it easier for the local government to find locations for POS and insure proper infrastructure, and will not significantly effect apartment prices.

However, she was against erasing the regulation that allowed construction companies to secure land and project documentation, and do work so POS without public competitions. She said that this would minimize the number of possible locations for POS.

Even though she feels that it should be impossible to sell POS apartments for a profit, she feels some people should be excluded from the recommended restriction of sales of POS apartments for ten years. The exclusions would include those, who because of changed life situations, want to buy a new apartment in the same program.