Local Referendum on a Plaque and Square Name
In a municipality of 3,400 registered voters in Istria, a citizens' initiative collected 760 verified signatures under the municipal statute, which sets a 20% threshold for a local referendum. The initiative demands that the municipal council remove a plaque in the main square honouring a local wartime commander and rename the square after a scientist. The mayor refuses to call the referendum, arguing that (a) the plaque is on a building entered in the register of protected cultural property and (b) historical memory and wartime commemoration are state matters, not local self-government. The initiative has come to you for advice. They want to know whether the subject is within the municipality's competence, what the cultural-property status changes, and how they can challenge the mayor's refusal if the council does not act.
1. Is the subject of the initiative within the municipality's local self-government competence, or is it exclusively a state matter as the mayor says?
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Local self-government covers matters of local interest that are not assigned to state bodies. Naming a square and deciding on local commemorative plaques are typically local communal and cultural decisions, not an exclusive state monopoly. Historical memory is not reserved to the state; local units may commemorate, provided they respect the law and constitutional order. The municipal statute and the referendum rules must be checked. The mayor's blanket claim is therefore too broad. The council should separate the legal question of competence from the political question of whether the plaque should stay.
2. What difference does the plaque's location on a building in the register of protected cultural property make?
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Cultural-property status does not transfer the whole decision to the state, but it adds a mandatory conservation step. If removing or altering the plaque affects the protected building or its listed elements, the municipality must obtain prior approval from the competent conservation department. A local referendum cannot override that approval requirement. If the plaque itself is not a protected element, the conservation issue may be limited to how the facade is treated. The initiative should ask the county conservation office for a written opinion before the council votes, so the referendum question is not legally impossible to implement.
3. If the mayor refuses and the council does not call the referendum, what legal route can the initiative use?
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The initiative should first use the municipal statute: request a council session, submit the verified signatures, and demand a reasoned decision. If the council refuses, an administrative dispute before the Administrative Court is the ordinary route, because a refusal to act on a statutory referendum procedure is an administrative matter. A constitutional complaint may follow only after other remedies are exhausted and if a constitutional right, such as local self-government or the right to local referendum, is violated. The initiative should keep a paper trail of signatures, dates, and refusals. It should not organise a private vote, because that would not have legal effect.