The Municipality of Ulcinj has appealed to the Government of Montenegro not to adopt the plan for temporary facilities in the Coastal Zone until all outstanding lease issues are resolved. At the same time, the cabinet of the Mayor of the Municipality, Gencij Nimanbegu, demands that the use of the coastal zone be enabled this year through an annex as in the previous year, since, as stated in the statement, not all conditions for granting a multi-year lease have been met.
"The Municipality of Ulcinj has previously conducted consultations with all stakeholders involved in the process of leasing temporary facilities in the coastal zone with the aim of resolving open issues that arose in the previous period. Bearing in mind that the Public Company for the Management of the Coastal Zone (JP) has implemented a series of activities that increase revenues exclusively by increasing prices, we believe that at this moment such a policy is extremely one-sided with potential negative effects on the economy of Ulcinj," reads a statement from Nimanbegu's office.
It is emphasized that such an approach would lead to a large, economically unrealistic increase in rental prices, which would have negative effects and reflect on the tourist offer of Ulcinj, and that in that case the Municipality would have to react with the intention of preventing negative impacts on the economy.
"In addition to this approach, it is extremely unacceptable that businessmen who have been paying rent, investing in and maintaining bathing areas for many years are being neglected in the process of leasing bathing areas by the new points policy. In this way, conditions are created for us to face the season with closed bathing areas until the PE determines who owns which bathing area," the statement reads.
It is also recalled that an initiative was submitted through the Union of Municipalities to amend the Law on the Coastal Zone, which stipulates that the competences for managing the coastal zone belong to the local government units on whose territory the said zone is located.
"This completely eliminates the issue of the legitimacy of managing the municipal territory, which has been considered open for many years," the Ulcinj Municipality believes.
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