The mayor of Villeneuve de-la-Raho, a town less than 10 km south of Perpignan, responds to recent attacks against the eighteen-hole project which, according to her, will be a real green lung.
Owners are preparing legal complaints, notably for embezzlement and favoritism.
What do you have to say to them?
I have nothing to respond to complaints that have not yet been made.
And that does not scare me since all these procedures, these to come as you tell me and the others are not likely to suspend the work which has already started within a strictly legal framework as confirmed to us by the prefect recently.
We have been accustomed to these procedures for twenty years.
And they were all lost by those who wore them.
Do our opponents want to win the title of world champion of the longest procedural marathon?
There is also opposition from scientists to this golf project.
This column by 92 researchers from the University of Perpignan who denounce the continuation of this project while the department will be cruelly short of water this year and possibly the following years...
Our golf course is not responsible for the drought situation in the department.
The University of Perpignan is 10 minutes from our town.
To date, none of them have taken the time to come to town hall to consult the file and understand what we are doing to recycle water.
They sign without knowing.
What research have these scientists done to prevent us from finding ourselves in the difficult situation we are in today?
I invite them to come and meet me so that they can understand what our environmental approach is.
Perhaps they can learn from our project.
What would you tell them?
France is far behind in the second use of water.
This is only 1% compared to 13% in Italy or Spain.
Here we continue to wash the garbage trucks, clean the streets, water the stadiums with drinking water.
This is perfectly stupid.
New controversy last week with the position taken and then the change of heart by Pascal Grizot, the president of the French golf federation.
Yes, during an interview Pascal Grizot expressed his hostility but he had the wrong project.
It is not our site which is ultimately targeted by its critics.
He corrected.
And now he supports us.
This project includes a golf course and also a real estate program of six hundred housing units.
Is it really reasonable to concrete again?
If we had not set up this project from 2003, the area would have been entirely concreted as you say.
Because this space, particularly agricultural abandonment, is completely buildable on the outskirts of Perpignan.
We contributed to dividing by six the constructions around this golf course which will be operational in eighteen months.
Because it only takes eighteen months to build an eighteen-hole course.
The operators' companies scraped the earth on the plot to create a reserve to be used to shape the golf course.
Opponents propose that this set of plots be transformed into a wooded park instead of the real estate program and the golf course.
But the project is implemented today and all operations are carried out legally.
The prefecture assured us that everything could now move forward.
Construction work was therefore able to begin for the operators Belin Promotion and GGL.
As for transforming this space into a wooded park, someone would have to tell me with what money we will buy the plots.
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Who pays for the trees to be planted and the people who will have to take care of this forest?
The green lung here is golf.
And we have the means to water it in very good conditions with ultraviolet-treated effluent.
Today we can no longer irrigate a golf course with drinking water.
And this program will be a model for all of Europe.