SANTO DOMINGO.- The country’s 48,000 square kilometers have already ballooned to 72,000 since the division of Hispaniola Island in 1777, according to the deeds of property.

At least on paper, the Dominican territory grew around 24,000 square kilometers, thanks to the lack of defining lines, duplicated documents and the little collaboration between government agencies, said National Cadastre director Bolivar Marte, who complained of the illegal duplicity of functions.“Dominican Republic has 72,000 square kilometers in titles and that’s because here, when urbanizations are done, the city councils or any company which carries out a project doesn’t delineate the land as required."

He said when a zone is urbanized and streets, sidewalks and green areas are made, these spaces must be removed from the lot’s original title, but when the delineation isn’t done, the real property continues, on paper, having more land than in fact it really owns.

Marte blames that on some Government agencies whom he said maintain a double functionality, because "they all want to do their particular survey" and cites, mainly, the Public Works Ministry, the National Hydraulic Resources Institute (Indrhi), and the Internal Taxes Agency, which he said waste resources and money, doing a function which the law bestows on the Cadastre Agency. “That’s the reason for our disorder, because if an avenue is traced across a farm which has 20 tareas, that property is reduced 15 or 10 tareas, and the organization which built it is obliged to submit a document to us indicating the work realized with the amount expropriated."

He said that’s the reason that many people with title for 20 tareas only have 10, “and that’s the reason there’s more land on titles that what we have as a country."

Marte added that the effort is needed so the real area protected by the Environment Ministry could be known, “but no, because each institution has their land behind barricades."

SOURCE: diariolibre.com