<h1>South Moravian Region Lost the Battle for Development Principles</h1>

Brno - The South Moravian Region has definitively lost its legal battle over the principles of spatial development, which were annulled last year by the Supreme Administrative Court. The Constitutional Court (CC) rejected the council's complaint in December without a public hearing, as reported by ČTK today from the court database. Regardless of the decisions of the constitutional judges, the region has already begun preparing a new spatial plan, a key document for construction of regional significance, including major road routes.
According to the contested ruling, the region did not sufficiently assess the cumulative and synergistic effects on the environment and the health of residents during the preparation of the documentation, especially in the broader Brno agglomeration. The proposal to annul the principles, which were valid for only about a year, was submitted by a group of 14 municipalities and 13 individuals. The resulting verdict, which slowed down the preparation of several constructions, represents the largest intervention by the judiciary into spatial planning in the Czech Republic to date.
The council raised a number of objections regarding the procedural approach as well as the arguments of the Supreme Administrative Court in the constitutional complaint. For instance, it is claimed that the problem is that the court annulled the entire documentation, even though the proposal was aimed only at a part of it. However, the constitutional judges found no reason for intervention.
"Given that the Constitutional Court did not come to a conclusion regarding the violation of the constitutionally guaranteed rights of the complainant, it rejected the submitted constitutional complaint as evidently unfounded," states the resolution of the panel with reporter Kateřina Šimáčková, who coincidentally was recently a judge at the Supreme Administrative Court. The resolution can be found in the Nalus database under case number I.ÚS 3619/12.
The creation of a new regional spatial plan is currently in the preparatory phase. Next year, the region intends to select a company that will develop the principles in collaboration with the office. Four companies have applied for the tender. For 2015, the region plans discussions and approvals.