New law from May 7. For late submission of a letter, a fine of PLN 500 per day

• On May 7, an amendment comes into force extending the deadline for local governments to prepare general plans.
• Due to the approaching deadline, municipalities are receiving an avalanche of applications for development conditions.
• Delays are punishable by high fines - PLN 500 for each day of delay.

As we wrote in WNP, the amendment to the Spatial Planning and Development Act extends the deadline for local governments to prepare general plans by half a year, until 30 June 2026.

This solution is intended to enable municipalities to complete the preparation of general plans without suspending the adoption of local plans and the issuing of decisions on development conditions.

According to information provided at the beginning of April by the Deputy Minister of Development and Technology, Michał Jaros, work on general plans began in 1992 out of 2477 communes.

It is worth remembering that, according to the new regulations , a decision on development conditions (so-called wuzetka) can only be obtained for properties located in the area covered by the OUZ (development supplementation area) indicated in the aforementioned general plan.

This means that if a given plot is not included in this area, it will not be possible to obtain a decision on the development conditions and therefore nothing will be built there.

• Therefore, owners of real estate located in municipalities that have not yet adopted general plans shall submit applications for the issuance of development conditions in accordance with the existing rules.
• Thanks to this, in the future they will not have problems building houses on their plots.
• Those who do not make it may have a problem if it turns out that the commune's decision will make it impossible to construct buildings in their area.

All this has resulted in local governments being literally flooded with applications.

In many communes, the increase in the number of applications for development conditions compared to previous years reaches 100 percent or even more - notes prawo.pl.

Importantly, if the commune exceeds the deadline for issuing development conditions , it may result in a fine of PLN 500 for each day of delay.