Minister of Construction and Housing, Chaim Ketz, and Director General of the Ministry of Construction and Housing and the Authority, and Acting Director General of the National Urban Renewal Authority, Yehuda Morgenstern, held a roundtable discussion last weekend with leading entrepreneurs that dealt with the challenges of implementing urban renewal projects and ways to remove obstacles hindering their progress.
During the discussion, an open and in-depth dialogue took place, during which the entrepreneurs pointed out key obstacles hindering project implementation, including: the issue of the uncooperative tenant, lack of economic feasibility due to land values, high execution costs, the impact of interest rate environment, the involvement of Israel Land Authority in some projects, difficulties in development agreements, the method of collecting betterment levies, and general price increases in the industry. Alongside this, proposals for possible regulatory and planning solutions were presented.
Minister Chaim Ketz emphasized the need to accelerate the pace of execution on the ground, increase the supply of housing units, and remove regulatory and planning obstacles, and instructed the professional staff to examine feasible solutions within the responsibility of the ministry and the Urban Renewal Authority in particular, and with other planning bodies in general.
Director General of the Ministry of Construction and Housing and Acting Head of the National Urban Renewal Authority, Yehuda Morgenstern, noted that there are over 100,000 housing units in approved plans that have not yet been realized into building permits, mainly in the center of the country, due to damage to economic feasibility in light of rising construction costs.
In conclusion of the discussion, Morgenstern emphasized that the state, led by the Ministry of Construction and Housing, must act to promote legislative amendments and complementary tools, including examining more profitable standards in cooperation with the Government Appraiser, and noted that close cooperation between the public and private sectors is key to the success of urban renewal in Israel.