Church property, sign here, please!

THE municipally-owned Los Molinos community centre in Almeria City is listed as Church property. The anomaly was pointed out last year by former councillor Deborah Seron.

Los Molinos was built as a school by the Madrid Press Association in 1891 after disastrous flooding and acquired by the municipal corporation two years later.

It was registered by the Church in the 1990s, thanks to a soon-to-be amended law allowing the ecclesiastical authorities to acquire properties of uncertain ownership with nothing more than a bishop’s signature.

The confusion arose because the Church has other properties nearby, city hall explained last year.

Although still registered as belonging to Almeria diocese, the matter is in hand, said City Planning councillor Ramon Fernandez-Pacheco. There would be no problem in reclaiming it as municipal property, he insisted.