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What fresh hell is this? Goodbye to the hórreos?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Satírico
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Satírico

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What better way to start the day, eh? Bad news.

If I've read this right, the hórreos are now threatened by an extortionate tax which makes it very likely that country folk will simply pull them all down.

http://www.elconfidencial.com/cultura/2017-02-02/horreos-ibi_1324330/

I for one would be greatly saddened to see another aspect of tradition wrecked by the remorseless greed of the taxman (sorry, taxperson) but what about the inconvenience to those people dwelling in pueblos in northern Spain, never mind the picturesque value?


That said, hórreos are probably versatile enough that they can be restored as soon as the decision is reversed. If there's a petition somewhere, please share it and let's register our dismay.

Buen camino
 
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The news says that from now the municipalities can charge taxes (IBI) to horreos in Asturias because sometimes is a living place with no taxes (as far as I know this doesn´t affect Galicia). The Asturian people love so much their horreos that I don´t think they easily disappear.
 
once the ball starts rolling... the article refers to the Autonomous Community of Asturias neighbouring Galicia. Definitely not good news
 
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Philip347 said:
If there's a petition somewhere, please share it and let's register our dismay.
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I'm not sure why you want us to become embroiled in one side of what is clearly a political issue for the regional governments, other than your polemic indicates your own opposition to this.
 
I won't get into the political dispute (though the article does point out that where this is happening the property tax levied on hórreos is about 50 euros a year), but one statement repeated several times did catch my eye -- it is illegal to live in horreos in Asturias. As many of you know, one of our favorite Primitivo albergues has an hórreo that was restored by the former owner and serves as the owner's living quarters. The article mentioned several AirBnb listings that offer hórreos for rent, so there do seem to be some legitimate concerns about property tax evasion.

Podemos has taken up the cause, so this debate is not yet over!
 
I read the OP as expressing dismay that many hórreo owners may find themselves squeezed by a tax, and that we might lose a lot of them as a result. That's clearly a Camino issue. Think back to the numbers of them you have seen, the numbers of pictures that have been posted, and the numbers of questions that have been answered about what those unusual looking structures are. I would consider a petition to save horreos on the Camino along the same lines as a petition to stop the industrial development outside Sarria (which was successful, btw, and which many forum members participated in).

But I wanted to issue a p.s. to remind people that our rules prohibit political discussions, so let's keep this discussion on the "fact providing" side of the line and not wade into our opinions about municipal property taxes. That's a pretty hard line to draw, so forum members, use good judgment.
 
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Informing us about this as a fact might be a camino issue. Pleading with us to petition about is is clearly a political one.
 
This like many other labour intensive thingd will disappear from civil servants' minds. There is no way they are going to count horreos and come check if the 50€ have been paid. Especially once the "culture groups" chime in.

But I can understand how they would want people who have turned them into homes, perhaps without permits and inspections, to pay taxes as they would on any other place of residence. 50€ for that is a steal!
 
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Mark Lee said:
You turn a barn into a living space and don't expect it to be taxed like a living space or fall under the same regulations as a living space?
C'mon, gimme a break.
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Well, in fairness, if you read the article, you'll see that illegal conversions of hórreos is not the focus of the tax. It has been used by municipalities as a revenue measure, and the average in the towns where the hórreos are taxed is 50 euros a year. It just happened that this tax has brought to light the fact that there are some that have been converted into living spaces, and that is apparently illegal irrespective of whether you pay taxes on your hórreo or not. I don't think anyone is arguing here that you should be able to avoid property taxes by living in a hórreo.

The OP's original dismay comes, I think, from the fact that by taxing horreos, which are used mainly as storage sheds by people in Asturias, is going to result in people tearing them down.
 
The article is way too complicated for me to fully understand as my Spanish is limited (and yes, I know Google Translate) and my knowledge of taxation in Spain is zero. Do I understand correctly that the owner of the horreo is not necessarily the owner of the land on which it is built? Is this common?
 
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I hope you are right.

Out of curiosity: when I type horreos Galicia into Google Images, I get mainly images of these unusual longish rectangular structures that look like a miniature church or a sarcophagus to me, while horreos Asturias yields mainly images of a sort of square shaped wooden shed on stilts - very similar to structures I've seen in the Swiss Valais (Wallis) area. Are these images typical for the differences between Galicia and Asturias?
 
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Yes this is basically the difference. Horreos in Galicia are rectangular and in Asturias are square. That division doesn´t follow exactly the border, because the Galician type enters Asturias in the North till Navia and the Asturian type exists in Galicia in mountainous areas in the East . I think that the horreos in O Cebreiro are Asturian type. I have in Galicia two family horreos but I can´t show them on the forum because all the pics I have of them have people (sorry).
 
No. this is not common. At least in Galicia I don´t know any case.
 
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Now that you mention it ..... Isn't that little grocery store in O Cebreiro off to the side of the road inside a restored hórreo (of the square Asturian type)?
 
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Stephen Nicholls said:
No it's not.
We're just expressing our 'love' of these buildings and our sorrow if they disappear.
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Well done young sir if we knocked down the beautiful buildings in Astorga and the old bridges along the camino then would the comments be the same there has been so much of the original camino placed under new roads and redirected because of progress tax's and purely profit before Camino business.
 
Apart from possible taxes, an horreo has maintenance costs. Most horreos have more than 60 years and therefore restoring them with the original materials can be very expensive.
Back to the horreo in O Cebreiro, it is also a palloza, so it has a straw roof. Restoring that kind of roof can cost between 4.000 and 10.000 euros depending on the size and the availability of the handful of specialists who can carry out that complicated work. Fortunately for the pallozas in O Cebreiro the Diputación de Lugo finances those costs (for the moment).
 
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dougfitz said:
That's a rather tortured analysis. I must remember this next time I vote, and express my gratitude for a political candidate who has volunteered to represent me in parliament!!
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Is this really worth arguing about, tho?
 
JillGat said:
Is this really worth arguing about, tho?
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I thought so, and still do. It goes to whether or not the moderators are going to police rule No 2 - no discussions on religion, bull fights , sports and politics, consistently and effectively, which clearly they are not in this case where where we have been asked to:
Philip347 said:
If there's a petition somewhere, please share it and let's register our dismay.
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The defence of this inaction was offered by @Stephen Nicholls was that a signing petition could be interpreted differently:
Stephen Nicholls said:
No it's not.
We're just expressing our 'love' of these buildings and our sorrow if they disappear.
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As I have yet to see a petition that isn't, by its very nature, an effort to change a decision, and in this case the decision in question is one made by what appears to be a democratically elected government, I think Stephen's argument is just sophistry. We are being asked to participate in a political act.
 
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Hey, I didn't describe it. I most pointedly said, 'If I read this right...' And it is perfectly clear from the responses that there is room for doubt and uncertainty on the subject and what will follow in this case. And posting another link does not, on your part, describe something, accurately or otherwise.
 
Well, I think the article posted by Kathar1na is more of a follow up than a contradiction in any way. It describes the negative reaction of the government of the region of Asturias to the national government's authorization of municipal government taxation of hórreos. A three way governmental conflict, just like those local-state-federal federalism messes in the US. Seems like as things now stand, though, Asturias has no power to stop municipalities from imposing taxes on hórreos, but there may be some technical conflicts with taxing hórreos while at the same time having them on some kind of preservation list. Seems like there are many steps to go before this issue is resolved.
 
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As one of several moderators who decided to let this go, I have to say that I at least was able to draw a line between petitions to save hórreos from petitions to support secession from Spain or to abolish the monarchy. You are right, Doug, that petitions are political by their nature, but we have had several successful petition campaigns here on the forum involving preservation of the Camino (preventing industrial destruction, preserving original bridges that were threatened with flooding, protection of the route itself on the Aragonés), and this hórreo issue seems to fit comfortably under that umbrella. But it is all sort of hypothetical since no one that I know of has found or started a petition of this sort. It seemed to be a rhetorical call to action. Given the intergovernmental mess I described above, it's not clear to whom you would address the petition anyway.
 
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Here I am, doing what I just complained about; debating something that - in my view - is pretty benign. Anyway. First of all the OP didn't advocate *starting* a petition or starting any kind of political action. He just said that, if there is a petition, he and like-minded people would want to sign it. There are all different kinds of petitions, aimed at different governmental or organizational bodies. I live in New Mexico, in the US. People come from all over the world to see our cultural and historic sites. (Historic for us is only 1600!) Some of them may only still exist and be kept in repair because of the interest of (and revenue from) tourists. Some of the whole towns - like in Spain - may only still be populated and exist because of the visitors who value them. So there are petitions aimed at legislators, taking sides and advocating for political change. There may also be a petition to a tourist bureau, registering appreciation and support for saving a historic, cultural aspect of their region. Knowing or learning that there are many pilgrims passing through who love the sight of the horreos may, in some small way, give those locals trying to save them even more impetus (or reason for providing funding) to do so. Are we not allowed to weigh in and add our support to such a movement, if it already exists? Is this forum not the place to share such information? All that being said, it seems to me that the point of his post was to share the article with us and start a discussion about the horreos, which it did. I didn't read it as focusing on a push for political change.
 
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Have I got this right so far...

If the local government in Asturias decide to use their tax raising powers to tax some types of hórreos... (which they haven't yet)...

And If the people who own the hórreos decide to demolish them to avoid paying the said tax...(which they haven't yet)...

Then someone as yet unspecified might start a petition to either "abolish the tax not yet introduced" or "to preserve the hórreos not yet under threat"...

In which case the Moderators might have to have a discussion about whether discussing the non existent petition against the non existent tax to save the unthreatened hórreos is against forum rules.

On a more serious note this issue has been raised before over the years in various places where local planners take steps to preserve hórreos left to fall into disuse or adapted as dwellings without relevant statutory consents. It is local councils who take these decisions affecting the local people who vote for them. I say leave them to it. It's their country.
 
dougfitz said:
Informing us about this as a fact might be a camino issue. Pleading with us to petition about is is clearly a political one.
Click to expand...
its up to the reader to choose what they want to take from this. There are too many nanie states in this world , I prefer to be informed, it's better to be informed than be ignorant of the facts. This is something that may well affect us Peregrinos
 
Camino Way markers in Bronze
The one from Galicia (the round) and the one from Castilla & Leon. Individually numbered and made by the same people that make the ones you see on your walk.
I'm now opting out of this forum.
 
Some of these comments are making me wish I had been quicker to lock the thread. I am sorry that people were offended, and I am still scratching my head trying to understand how we got to the contentious and nasty place we wound up. I think the main point of this post was to alert people to the fact that there are towns in Asturias that have started taxing hórreos, that it is within their local power to do so, that the Region is trying to figure out a way to step in and undo that, and that there is a risk that some owners will let them fall down rather than keep them up and pay taxes. That prospect, understandably to anyone who has walked through "hórreo land", was a cause of concern.

I thought that this was an issue of general interest to pilgrims. And I also thought the off-handed comment about a petition to express our dismay was peripheral and beside the point, just an expression of an opinion about how wonderful these old structures are. But some people just seem to be itching for a fight, so I'll lock the thread now. Buen camino, Laurie
 
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