Birgu council favours ODZ old people’s home

Birgu’s Labour mayor John Boxall has told MaltaToday the council favours the development of a private old people’s home in the vicinity of the protected Ta’ Hawli valley, which is outside development zones.

But he denied having ever had any contact with the St Paul Residential Homes, a company owned by Joseph Gaffarena, which has presented a planning application to develop the home, which is still being screened by MEPA.

Back in 2011 Boxall revealed that discussions had started between two private entities over a piece of land that would serve as an elderly home for residents of Birgu and surrounding localities, in the St Lawrence band club’s newsletter.

He wrote that the council was asked to be “indirectly involved in the project and to give its approval after the conclusion of negotiations”.

But Boxall has now said he has had no contact with the developers, having learnt of the planning application presented last year from his Facebook newsfeed.

The mayor said he would be calling on MEPA to consult with the council.

Although the private home will only be offering services against payment, Boxall said Birgu was “badly in need of an old people’s home due to its ageing population.”

He said the existing old people’s home in neighbouring Bormla was not enough to satisfy the demand for the Cottonera area.

“There is no space for an old people’s home inside Birgu’s urban area, which already has a very high density,” Boxall said when quizzed on the impact on one of the few remaining green lungs of Cottonera.

But when it was pointed out to him that the area is a protected valley, Boxall replied that before making judgements one should study the exact location where the old people’s home will be developed. “The idea site would be on an area overlooking the valley,” which he described as a glacis – an artificial slope which forms part of the fortifications.  

He pointed out that this area has already been devolved to the council to be developed as a public garden at a site known as Ta’ Fuq il-Hawli.

In September 2013 Joseph Gaffarena applied to construct a four-storey high home for the elderly in an afforested area outside development zones in Birgu, over a 2,770 square metre site in the vicinity of the protected Tal-Hawli valley in Triq San Dwardu and Triq Guzeppi Decelis, near the former Fortini secondary school.

The application was presented by Prof. Mark Brincat on behalf of St Paul Residential Homes and fresh plans were submitted to MEPA on 22 May 2015.

The case is currently awaiting the submission of the requirements indicated in the screening letter.

Labour MP Charles Buhagiar is listed as “project architect” in the plans submitted to MEPA.

Buhagiar is also the government-appointed chairman of the Building Industry Consultative Council, whose Valletta offices are the subject of a controversial government expropriation when it was revealed that Gaffarena’s son Marco was paid €1.65 million in cash and lands for his 50% ownership of the offices on Old Mint Street.

The Birgu site at Tal-Hawsli, which is fully owned by Gaffarena’s company, has already had a 1992 request for garages and stores refused by MEPA. In 1997 however, it issued Marco Gaffarena a permit to erect a maisonette and a garage over a small part of the site. 

The area is designated by the Grand Harbour Local Plan as one of scientific and ecological importance: the area includes almond, carob and olive trees, prickly pears, peach and fig trees, vines, and trees of heaven and oleanders. 

The developers of the old people’s home have acknowledged that they would have to uproot a number of trees and demolish existing rubble walls.