MMR will receive a negative price Antipanel

Ostrava - The Ministry for Regional Development (MMR) will receive a new special award in the Moravian-Silesian Region Facade Competition titled Antipanel. The seven-member jury of the competition decided on the granting of this negative award to highlight poor decisions or institutions that have most significantly contributed to delaying or halting the repairs of panel houses, said the spokesperson for the competition, Lenka Hatlapatková, today to ČTK. MMR considers the awarding of the prize to be unfair.
    According to the representatives of the jury, it is a similar award to the well-known Ropák for an anti-ecological act, Hatlapatková stated.
    "The jury unanimously agreed to grant this special award to MMR, which last autumn decided to cease accepting applications for grants intended to support repairs, modernizations, and reconstructions of panel houses under the Panel program," explains the decision of the jury, the author of the competition Tomáš Závada.
    According to the jury, the grant was a significant motivation for residents of panel houses to engage in repairs and insulation. "It is quite an unfortunate decision. Furthermore, as of today, it is still unclear whether and when the program will be relaunched," Závada stated. He added that representatives of the Czech-Moravian Union of Housing Cooperatives, tenant protection organizations, the authorized Chamber of Architects, and others had already protested against the suspension of grants with an open letter.
    The awarding of the prize is unfair because MMR has been and continues to take steps to ensure that the program can continue, responded Miroslav Kalous, Deputy Minister for Legislation and Housing Policy. He reminded that the State Housing Development Fund did not accept grant applications in the Panel program at the end of last year because the funds for 2007 had already been exhausted. Overall, and not just MMR, the volume of finances allocated for national programs has been reduced because one of the priorities of the state budget for the period 2007 to 2013 is to ensure co-financing of European funds, Kalous explained. Therefore, according to him, the support in the Panel program in 2008 was reduced from the anticipated approximately 3.5 billion to 1.6 billion CZK.
    "Currently, we are negotiating with the Ministry of Finance on whether it will be possible to supplement the originally proposed total amount of resources allocated for the Panel program in 2008 from the existing 1.6 billion so that the support can continue this year at a similar level as last year," added Kalous.
    In this year's Moravian-Silesian Region Facade Competition, 98 entities are competing, 23 more than last year. The winner of the sixth edition will be announced on March 26. A condition for registration was the placement of the construction within the Moravian-Silesian Region and the completion of the facade in 2007. Additionally, it could not be a new construction, only a facade reconstruction.