The mayor of Sant Josep, Vicent Roig (PP), met Friday night with the neighbors evicted from block A of the Don Pepe apartments, where he announced his commitment to review the declaration of ruin of the building, which has been closed since December 2021. According to several local media, during the meeting, held in front of the building and provoked by two neighbors who jumped the seal and entered their homes, the mayor responded to the request of two owners: “I am not a technician, but after seeing the current conditions of the building, without imminent visible damage, I think a review is necessary,” said Roig. According to Diario de Ibiza, the neighbors Anisa Mohamed and Isidora Martín, who occupied the ground and fifth floors respectively, asked the mayor to summon municipal technicians. In response, the head of Urbanism went to the site to assess the condition of the structure and collect photographic evidence.
Frustration
Mohamed, one of the affected neighbors, expressed the frustration of the evictees: “We have been waiting for years for a solution that has not arrived. We want to be listened to and for humanity to be put into this matter,” she declared.
New report
The Consistory, according to the mayor, will request a new technical report on the state of block A. Roig said that if buildings in similar conditions have been able to be recovered, the Don Pepe could have a viable solution. “What I have seen are just raised tiles and some dust; I am convinced that buildings in worse conditions, and without being by the sea, would have deteriorated more in three years of closure,” Roig added to the support of the assembled neighbors. The affected families also demand an urgent meeting of the monitoring committee of the building, where two neighbors are represented by each staircase of the block. Roig confirmed that he will request such a meeting this Monday and that he has already informed the Balearic Minister of Housing, José Luís Mateo, about the situation. It should be recalled that since 2021, block A has been evicted without significant progress in the management of the housing problem that afflicts these families.
The Balearic Government considered last July the possibility of legalizing block A through a special administrative process approved in the summer, which could allow its rehabilitation. However, the measure has not moved forward, which has increased the desperation of the families, who say they feel abandoned by the authorities. “We are ashamed that they have had to come to this to get the attention of the administration,” acknowledged Roig, who was sympathetic to the neighbors’ situation and expressed his desire to find a solution as soon as possible.
