A year has passed already since the devastating storms hit Slovenia. The water receded, and the government’s promises of a speedy solution to the housing problems of the flood victims disappeared as soon as the tragedy was forgotten by the mainstream media. At the time, Prime Minister Robert Golob said that the rehabilitation would be quick and hundreds of new houses would be built in a matter of months – he even promised that procedures would be shortened for flood victims, and prefabricated houses were announced. However, a year later, the government has not built a single house, and a few weeks ago, we saw the Prime Minister strategically posing at the opening of the first newly built house for flood victims, for which the state did not contribute a single euro, as it was paid for from private funds. In the following article, we exclusively present the story of a family that received a lot of media coverage after the floods, as their house was literally buried under rubble. A year later, the family is still living in the former kindergarten.
The Krajnc family – Peter Krajnc, his wife Bernarda B. Krajnc and their four-year-old son Tilen – were among the worst affected families in last year’s floods. The house in Strmec near Luče, which Bernarda and Peter had just finished renovating, close to the houses where Bernarda’s ancestors had lived for generations, was swept away by the water. They lost everything.
An avalanche, which had formed vertically above the house, swept away and buried the house and the car. No rehabilitation was possible, nor was an assessment of the possibility of continuing to live on the property, as was the case with most of the other flood victims, as the house was literally carried away by the force of nature and partially buried under massive stones.
Luckily, they escaped just in time, and their son was on holiday on the fateful day. They lost everything they had built over the years. At the time, they were still filled with optimism, with the Prime Minister promising all sorts of things – from building new housing and prefabricated houses, to changing the rigid bureaucracy exclusively for flood victims. Most of the flood victims were then convinced that they would soon be able to live in their own homes again.
However, the cameras of the big media quickly moved on to the next thing. The floods disappeared from the headlines. Once that happened, even government politicians no longer had any motivation to make a difference, as the floods no longer provided sufficient political capital. It was easier to deal with Palestine, the nutrias, the wolves and the cultural struggle. The Krajnc family is just one of the families that have been forgotten.
What is happening to the Krajnc family today?
One year after the floods, the Krajnc family still has no home of its own. The municipality accommodated them in a small house that once served as a kindergarten. The destroyed house was not yet insured, as they were in the renovation phase, which was just about to be finished at the time of the flood – after ten years of hard work.
Even though they have already found a plot of land they would like to build on, the road to owning their own home is still long. The municipality first needs to resolve the zoning plan, which will change the land’s use to building land, and only then will they even have the chance to buy the new land they have chosen. After the purchase, the next step will be to apply for a building permit, for which legends circulate in Slovenia about how difficult it is to obtain and how time-consuming it is. This means that a year after the floods, the Krajnc family is still at the very beginning. Why?
Bureaucracy is to blame
“The new plot is where things are getting complicated,” says Peter Krajnc, the owner of the former house. “The biggest rigidity I notice is that we can’t even buy the land where we want to build a new house, because the ministry has not yet allowed us to change the use of the land,” he pointed out.
“In our municipality [in Luče], we are limited because we don’t know where it is safe to build at all. We have found a suitable location, and the owners are also willing to sell us the plot,” Krajnc explained, stressing that a prerequisite for any further planning of the construction is that the Ministry [of Agriculture, Forestry and Food] allows the change of use of the former forest land.
“The procedures are now – as far as I’m concerned – dragging on for way too long,” Krajnc complained. “We don’t even know yet whether it will be possible to build there or not. The site has been checked as far as safety is concerned, but then the ministry stopped everything. A whole bunch of opinions have to be obtained so that the municipality can finally amend the spatial plan,” he added.
Everything stops at the ministries
Krajnc said that nobody is promising them anything anymore. Even the ministry representatives themselves do not know how the matter will work out. The municipality is doing its best to extend the spatial plan because it is naturally motivated to keep the residents in the same municipality where they used to live. The procedures at the ministry have been dragging on for months without explanation, and Krajnc explained that when it is the holiday season, things are even slower.
Mentioning that the Prime Minister had promised to speed up bureaucratic procedures, Krajnc said that the procedures were just the same as they had been before. In this area, he said, “absolutely nothing has changed,” and ministries are where things come to a standstill.
The municipality is trying, but the ministries always find new bureaucratic obstacles
“I communicate with the municipal planner regularly. The municipality is constantly sending letters and requests for the matter to be resolved. But something is always wrong, something always needs to be completed. It gets complicated at ministries or at the national level. Unfortunately, I am a victim of bureaucracy,” Krajnc pointed out, adding that this is not some huge forest land that needs to be destroyed, but a 400 square metre plot of land. The ministry is still unable to take a decision even in the case of those who have been most affected. Krajnc himself does not understand why the ministry’s procedures are taking so long for less than 400 square metres of former forest land.
New promise for September, but still a long way to a new home
He added that they were recently promised that things would be sorted out by September, but after a long year, Krajnc no longer has confidence in the government’s promises. “Then they reject something again, and in the meantime, there are holidays, and again, something has to be completed,” he pointed out.
Be warned – even in the best-case scenario, if the ministry does indeed allow the municipality to extend the spatial plan and change its use, this is still only the beginning. At that point, the family would only be able to buy the land. Then the other bureaucratic procedures will begin, which include obtaining a building permit, to start with. It is, therefore, almost impossible to expect that the family will be able to start living in their new home this year.
The Krajnc family saga is just one of many
Who is to blame for the fact that a year after the floods, Peter, Bernarda and their son Tilen are still living in a former kindergarten? Peter Krajnc is convinced that it is the ministries, and therefore the executive – the government. It is clear from his account that the ministries refuse to help and even actively sabotage the flood victims.
The flood victims and the mayors of the affected towns are loudly criticising the slow recovery – even mayors who are declared leftists. The municipality of Črna na Koroškem has already warned of the difficulties in securing funding, the cumbersome bureaucratic procedures and the great psychological distress of the people – also as a result of the new floods.
The political elite are posing for the cameras in Paris, but they forgot about Luče
People are still waiting, literally homeless, while the top echelons of politics are in Paris, rebuilding Tito monuments, restoring the Franja partisan hospital and dealing with the situation in the Middle East. It should be recalled that part of the money that was supposed to be used for flood reconstruction also “floated” into the purchase of the dilapidated building at 51 Litijska Street, which resulted in the resignation of former Minister of Justice, Dominika Švarc Pipan.
The floods were only good for the government to find excuses for its general debacle, when, in fact, the whole country is in paralysis, and government officials can claim it is because of flood reconstruction. What flood reconstruction? Nothing has happened. The Krajnc family will spend at least one more Christmas under a roof that is not theirs, and so will the other 649 displaced people. The cameras have been turned off, and the politicians are already looking forward to new victories in Olympic Paris. Meanwhile, the Krajnc family is waiting for ministry officials to return from their holidays.
Questions for the ministry
We sent a question to the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Food, headed by Mateja Čalušić, regarding the Krajnc family’s calvary.
We wanted to know why the procedures are “moving ahead” so slowly. What happened in the end to the Prime Minister’s promises to speed up bureaucratic procedures? Why does the family have to wait for mercy in the former kindergarten, why does the Ministry refuse to allow the municipality to change the use of 400 square metres of forest land? We will publish the Ministry’s answers as soon as we receive them.
Mitja Iršič
