Author: Natalia Trujillo Varela
The council was warned that the homes are in an environmental protection zone and at high risk of landslides.
It will have to comply with a ruling from 2015. Neighborhood residents claim that the characterization was hasty.
During the next six months, the mayor’s office of Armenia must comply with the court ruling on the purchase or acquisition of up to twelve homes for twelve families that need to be relocated and which are currently in an environmental protection zone and high risk zone. of landslide, in commune 7 in the Buenos Aires Bajo neighborhood.
This week the plenary session of the council authorized the mayor to purchase the homes and once the agreement is sanctioned, he will have a period of six months to comply.
THE JUDGE’S ORDER
Councilor Germán Darío Grisales Rodríguez, rapporteur of the draft agreement, recalled the obligations of the mayor’s office with this case. “On that occasion the judge ordered two things, the first is to carry out a study of the characterization of the families that are in Buenos Aires Bajo and that the prioritization of people in need of relocation be carried out, as the second part of the sentence is Precisely, the relocation, the issue is to prioritize and relocate them because they are in areas of high risk and environmental protection.”
Councilor Grisales Rodríguez referred to citizens’ statements that the characterization study was done poorly and included people who are not at high risk.
Read: X-ray of commune 9: pollution, insecurity, drug consumption
CITIZENS DEMAND GUARANTEES IN RELOCATION
Residents of the lower Buenos Aires neighborhood, as is the case of Gentil de Jesús Grisales González, assured that he has a cambuche as his home and that he has lived there for more than ten years, said that he is the owner and holder of the lot where he lives, and believed that The mayor’s office is not prepared to guarantee the inhabitants the conditions to evacuate.
“Until the mayor’s office gives us the security in the guarantees that it is going to provide us, we are not going to vacate, until it provides us with the housing that is the most worthy for us, we are not going to vacate, it turns out that the mayor’s office would be incurring crimes because, even though we benefited years ago, compliance has not been carried out, whether due to paperwork, administrative problems, etc. We ask that the Ombudsman’s Office and the media monitor us, that we have guarantees in the short, medium and long term,” he said.
Gustavo López, president of the JAC of the lower Buenos Aires neighborhood, for his part explained that the characterization carried out by the mayor’s office was hasty and took into account homes that are not at high risk.
MORE CONTROL TO AVOID INVASIONS
Councilor José Ignacio Rojas Sepúlveda said that it is necessary to update the study of risk areas in the POT, since the city has been growing in recent years and, at least, currently there is a record by the municipal mayor’s office, of up to 150 settlements.
