Return of the resort. Closer to the beginning or the end?
After more than 6 years of fighting in administrative proceedings, today we obtained for our clients a final decision on the return of the Iwonicz-Zdrój property.
The Law Firm, acting on behalf of the heirs of the pre-war owner of the property and filing an appeal on their behalf against the partially unfavorable decision of the first instance authority, obtained a decision of the Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development upholding the appeal in its entirety in favor of the Law Firm’s clients. The decision of the authority of the second instance states that the Iwonicz-Zdrój palace and park complex and spa complex, located in a village in the Podkarpackie province, did not in its entirety fall under the provisions of the PKWN decree on carrying out land reform. The Minister ruled that the property was not agricultural and could not be taken over by the Treasury after the end of World War II. The decision is final, although the parties still have a path before the administrative courts.
Due to the considerable lapse of time since the unlawful seizure of property by the People’s Republic of Poland and, above all, due to the numerous communalization acts involving clients’ property, a favorable decision not to fall under the decree is unlikely to mean a happy end to efforts to recover family assets. Rather, such a decision will be prejudicial in further legal proceedings, including compensation cases. It is not easy to obtain just compensation for unlawful state action.