The mystery of the origin of the cracks in homes and the wall of Morella will see the light at the end of the year
Until the end of this year, the Morella City Council does not foresee knowing the origin of the important cracks that have spread for more than a decade through different parts of the municipal area, affecting especiallyseveral homes in the district of Ortellsand that in recent months have begun to threaten the stability of a section of the city wall.
It is the calendar that the experts have marked after the last visit they made, last October, to the town to carry out a visual inspection of the situation. The meeting, in which the general director of Local Administration, José Antonio Redorat, as well as the College of Mining Engineers of the Valencian Community participated, served to advance a roadmap to the Morella City Council and to determine that, At this time, there is no “imminent risk” for the stability of buildings.
This has been confirmed by both the mayor, Bernabé Sangüesa (Independents per Morella), and councilor Jesús Lecha (Popular Party), who participated in the meeting. Both councilors advance that the collegiate body plans to send to the City Council at the end of the next February a technical and economic proposal to carry out a study and analysis of the cause of earth movements. From there, the deadlines are more imprecise, since depending on the cost the council must seek support from higher administrations to pay for it and hold a competition public for adjudication. These times, together with those of the execution of the analysis work and the search for a solution, will keep Morella still on tenterhooks until the end of this year.
One more year of waiting to find out the origin of a problem that Sangüesa and Lecha remember that they have been suffering from for more than a decade. «In Ortells the first cracks appeared many years ago, at that time the affected homes were not used as habitual residence, but in recent years the owners have begun to live in them all year round and to this we must add the aggravating factor that the cracks are increasingly larger,” explains the ‘popular’, adding that, in fact, “every year before Christmas the affected owners carry out repairs to prevent leaks and, in a few months, the damage reappears worse than before.” The mayor also remembers that earthworks also affect the church of the district: «About ten years ago the Generalitat reached an agreement with the Bishopric and already repaired the damage that existed then. Now they have reappeared,” Sangüesa laments.
In addition to the district of Ortells, where between 40 and 400 people live Throughout the year, cracks have also appeared in a section of the wall that surrounds the urban area of Morella. “We have no idea what the cause is,” says the mayor, concerned about the situation because “Morella City Council does not have the economic capacity to carry out large works, Therefore, any solution will easily have to go through the support of the Generalitat Valenciana”, since the powers in this area belong exclusively to the administration.
Finally, both the first mayor and the PP councilor point to the inaction of the previous government team of the Socialist Party. “When I became a councilor for the first time in 2019, I verified that the neighbors had already informed the City Council of the situation,” says Lecha. Sangüesa also knows that The Generalitat requested information from the council during the socialist mandate, “but as they have now let us know, they were never answered.”
