The City Council of Santa Cruz de Tenerife, under the leadership of the Canarian Coalition (CC) and the Popular Party (PP), is unaware of the number of legally operating holiday homes within the capital. This is evident from the reply provided by the City Council to an inquiry made by Mónica Brito, an opposition councillor for the PSOE.
“There isn’t a specific record for the activity designated as vacation housing,” the head of the Licensing service explained, justifying the inability to furnish the requested information to the mayor.
The official clarified that the local authority does not possess “a specific classification” that would facilitate the extraction of information solely pertaining to tourist homes from an array of classified activities. To obtain this data, “a manual review file by file” would be essential, he noted in his response to the councillor.
“Our management system does not operate like a database with specific filters for classified activities. We employ a file processor that does not enable us to automatically identify which files relate to prior communications of classified activities regarding vacation homes,” the official expounded.
Furthermore, he added, “We cannot determine in an automated way which files have been resolved, which leave the classified activity null and which ones remain operational.”
Patricia Hernández, the socialist spokesperson in Santa Cruz de Tenerife, highlighted during a control session last Thursday that the oversight powers concerning classified activities, including vacation homes, are within municipal jurisdiction, as established by law 7/2011, April 5.
In her remarks, Hernández reminded the Councilor for Territorial Planning, Zaida González, of statements made last Saturday by the Minister of Tourism of the Government of the Canary Islands. Jéssica de León, a PP member like González, asserted that town councils “not only have the duty but also the tools to organise the activity,” in accordance with decree 113/2015.
The Government of the Canary Islands has entrusted the regulation and oversight of this sector to the town councils. The Minister of Tourism recently stated that local administrations have “greater legal guarantees” under their planning authority to “suspend licenses” and responsible declarations of classified activities.
“What I want to emphasise is that the Urban Planning Management and the City Council of Santa Cruz de Tenerife do not possess knowledge of the number of legally operating holiday homes in the city. They are unaware and do not even show embarrassment when admitting it, stating they will not address it, because it is akin to running a hair salon. On a matter as pressing as housing,” lamented the PSOE spokesperson in the city council.
According to the Cabildo of Tenerife, over 7,200 holiday homes have been registered across the island from January to August of this year.
