“We’re abandoned. There’s no PRR (from) the council.” These words are read in graffiti on a house opposite the elementary school in Terra Chã.
The house where doctors from the military hospital and professors from the University of the Azores once lived is now uninhabited and vandalized. Six houses in this condition now belong to the Regional Government.
On a visit to the site, the mayor of Angra do Heroísmo, Álamo Meneses, guaranteed that the municipality intended to put the houses back into use. 
“The council, in due course, asked the Regional Government to transfer these properties to its patrimony. Although the regional government said yes, it didn’t carry out the transfer. It’s a shame these buildings are like this. They belong to the Regional Government and it would be good if the Regional Government also used some of its Recovery and Resilience Plan (PRR) and put it here,” he said.
Asked about the words written on one of the houses, less than a year before the local elections, Álamo Meneses reacted as follows: “It’s a just indignation from someone who probably has trouble getting housing and sees six beautiful houses in this state. I also felt like writing this”.
The mayor said he had contacted the Azorean executive before preparing the municipality’s applications for PRR funds for housing. Even though the properties were already closed, he was willing to restore them and build new ones on the adjacent land.
“Even if we can’t put them in the PRR, because the deadline has passed, we have the possibility of recovering them, as soon as the government wants to transfer these houses to the council’s assets,” he said.
A source from the regional housing directorate confirmed that there had been contact between the municipality and the regional government. Still, it claimed that the former management of the Terceira Island Science and Technology Park (Terinov), which now occupies the former premises of the University of the Azores, “merged the housing articles into a single article, and this made it impossible to apply for the PRR.”

In Diário Insular-José Lourenço, director.

Translated to English as a community outreach program from the Portuguese Beyond Borders Institute (PBBI) and the Modern and Classical Languages and Literatures Department (MCLL) as part of Bruma Publication and ADMA (Azores-Diaspora Media Alliance) at California State University, Fresno, PBBI thanks Luso Financial for sponsoring NOVIDADES.