Law that extinguishes reserves in Ilhabela is unconstitutional – 08/23/2023 – Environment

The Court of Justice of the State of São Paulo declared unconstitutional a municipal law that extinguished the Resex (extractive reserve) Baía dos Castelhanos, in Ilhabela, on the north coast of São Paulo. The city says it will appeal.

According to the Federal Public Ministry, the effect of the decision regarding unconstitutionality is immediate, even if the municipality appeals.

Resex de Castelhanos was created by municipal decree in December 2020, by the then mayor Maria das Graças dos Santos (PSD).

The extractive reserve covers an area of ​​almost 1 million m^two distributed over a 25 km stretch of coastline, between Ponta da Cabeçuda and Ponta da Pirassununga, in Castelhanos Bay.

The aim was to create a conservation unit for sustainable use to benefit traditional caiçara communities and explore ecological tourism.

The decree that created the RESEX was revoked on August 16 of last year by a bill authored by Mayor Toninho Colucci (PL), approved by 7 votes to 2.

The project was filed, read and voted on the same day, contrary to normal procedures, according to councilor Raul Cordeiro (PSD), one of the two who voted against the proposal.

Another controversial point is the fact that the mayor’s family owns a large area in Castelhanos. Collucci argues, however, that this does not interfere with his decisions about the resex.

“My father-in-law owns the former Castelhanos Farm, where his family planted bananas and sugarcane to produce cachaça, but there is no interest in promoting investments in the area, which has great sentimental value,” he says.

In Cordeiro’s view, the bill sought to harm the caiçara community. “It would not have and had not as the community, on that day [da votação]articulate to leave Castelhanos towards the Chamber to demonstrate against the approval of the project”, said Cordeiro.

“It would take them three to four hours to leave the community and arrive at the Chamber. They acted quickly to prevent any reaction from the island’s population.”

The councilor states that, since it is a project that would affect the traditional caiçara community of Castelhanos bay, where hundreds of people live on the beaches Vermelha, Mansa, in addition to Castelhanos itself, the proposal should be widely discussed, even , at public hearings.

The president of the Chamber, Alessandro Vieira (PL), said that there was conflict, at the time of the vote, between the residents of the community. They would have sought the House, according to Vieira, to ask for the repeal, “which is why we understood that the measure was necessary and urgent”. “However, we recognize the arguments and fully respect the Judiciary’s decision,” he said.

According to the MPF, the creation of the resex has been of great importance for traditional communities.

In a note, the Attorney’s Office stated that the creation of the Resex allowed both the land regularization of part of the territory of the caiçara community and the strengthening of environmental protection of a very important ecological heritage.

With this, privatization of the area was avoided, with occupation by private individuals that could jeopardize the way of life of the caiçaras, and the advancement of activities that would lead to degradation of the restinga and mangroves.

The MPF investigates alleged allegations of sales of areas belonging to the Union in Castelhanos Bay, but, for the time being, nothing has been proven.

The body warns that sales of land within the resex have no validity for property purposes. Union assets are not tradable and can only be used by individuals with express authorization from the SPU (Union Assets Secretariat). In the case of the RESEX, people with these authorizations were notified by the SPU to vacate the area in favor of the public purpose of the reserve.

The Municipality of Ilhabela will appeal the decision, according to a note, “given the irremediable flaws that compromise the act of creation of the resex, such as the lack of authorization and homologation by the Secretariat of Heritage of the Union, that is, it is a reserve made on top of area of ​​the Navy, without the consent of the Union for that”.

Another flaw in the creation of Resex, in the evaluation of the city hall, “is the lack of definition of the responsibility of each federative entity”. “In the event of expropriation of areas titled privately owned, it was not defined in the act of creation which entity —municipality, state or Union— would be responsible for the compensation”, says the administration.

Toninho Colucci says that the allegations of prosecutor Tadeu Badaró that supported the action that made the resex revocation unconstitutional.

“The resex was created by decree. The revocation was through a bill approved by the councilors, who represent the community of Ilhabela. The councilor represents the population. an issue that must be debated with the whole community,” he said.