Flood-affected municipalities will receive state-owned land for free for the construction of homes.

Prague - Municipalities affected by floods will receive land for the construction of family and apartment houses outside flood zones. The Ministry of Agriculture informed about this in a press release today. Suitable state-owned land has been identified by the State Land Office, which will subsequently transfer it to municipalities free of charge. Municipalities can provide the land to citizens or use it for new construction in safe parts of the municipality. This procedure was approved by the government today.

"We must not repeat the mistakes of the past when houses were built or repaired near watercourses, where they were again threatened by floods. We want people in the affected municipalities to stay, but it is not possible for them to rebuild their homes in places where they are threatened by large water," said Minister of Agriculture Marek Výborný (KDU-ČSL).

According to Výborný, municipalities will be able to build municipal apartments on the land and can also offer them to people whose houses were destroyed by the recent floods. "This will allow support for affected property owners whose properties were destroyed or became uninhabitable due to the floods and need to be demolished," added the director general of the land office, Svatava Maradová.

Construction on the transferred land must begin within two years. No later than five years after the registration of ownership rights to the land in the real estate cadastre in favor of the affected municipality, the construction must be completed, either in the form of an occupancy permit or by notifying the building authority.

Land in active flood zones, where flooded houses were located, can be used by municipalities or the state, for example, to implement flood protection measures.

Floods affected primarily the Moravian-Silesian and Olomouc regions in mid-September. In the Olomouc region, floods caused catastrophic damage in the Jeseník area and also impacted part of the Šumperk and Olomouc areas. After heavy rains, river levels gradually rose to the highest flood alert even in the South Bohemian region.