There were no surprises this afternoon when it came to the initial approval of the 2022 budgets, except for the technical incidents caused by connection failures that have prevented the online broadcast of the plenary session. They were not expected in the debate either. PSOE and Cs, the formations that have shared a government since 2019, have carried out without ruffling some municipal accounts that will be decisive in facing the final stretch of the mandate: a budget that increases to 85 million euros and raises investments to 7.8 million euros, 19% more.
And all the opposition –from one extreme to the other– has come together again to vote against the executive's proposal. Although these efforts by the mayors of Podemos, Vox, AxSí and PP have not managed to alter a result that was practically written in advance given the majority that PSOE and Cs have in the Municipal Corporation.
Of course, the government team has not been able to escape the barrage of criticism that has come from the opposition bench throughout the different interventions. The councilor of the PP, Inmaculada Marín, has pointed directly to what she considers the great problem of the budgets: the inability of the municipal government to execute them, which is why debating the convenience of some items or others in plenary becomes be completely useless.
In fact, the popular mayor has calculated that the next Treasury remainder will be around 30 million euros, "which will be added to this budget of 85 million euros." Some figures, she has lamented, which, however, are not used to alleviate the situation of the most disadvantaged. In fact, the PP has missed in this budget proposal a package of exceptional measures in this regard to minimize the impact of the pandemic on families. And, of course, faithful to his postulates, he has once again demanded a reduction in the tax burden to relieve the islanders.
AxSí San Fernando has positioned itself along the same lines, whose spokesperson, Fran Romero, has shown a vehement rejection of the 2022 budgets, describing them as "smoke and propaganda" and calling them electoralist given the proximity of the municipal elections in 2023, some accounts – he pointed out – prepared "to the greater glory" of the mayoress.
In that it has coincided with Vox San Fernando. His spokesperson, Carlos Zambrano, has accused the local government of using the budget in a partisan way to turn "the pre-election year into the year of propaganda for the PSOE", which he could not help but consider dishonest. He has also indicated that the income forecast was inflated and has indicated that the increase in expenses of the government bodies amounts to more than 730,000 euros. "It is a budget that does not respond to the interests of the city and yes to the partisan interests of the PSOE," he said.
For her part, the spokeswoman for Podemos, Ana Rojas, has considered that the budgets, in addition to being "zero participatory", "are quite far from reality and the problems that San Fernando has."
In terms of housing, for example, he has complained about the cut in 73% of the items, to go from 815,000 euros to just over 220,000 euros, "when it is a city that has serious public housing problems." The formation does not understand that only 100,000 euros are allocated to social rent, but that banks are paid "religiously" for the credits as long as they do not sit down with them to negotiate the empty houses in the city. "You negotiate with the banks 85% of the total investment budget: 6.7 million euros," he reminded the local government. That negligence with social rent is in contrast, he has insisted, to the commitment to include subsidized housing under a cooperative regime in the private housing promotions that have been announced. "They go against the housing plan that made it clear that renting was the only form of housing that was urgently needed in San Fernando," added the mayor.
Podemos has also criticized the increase in the budget for propaganda and publicity, "up to 877 euros a day"; and that of extraordinary lights, from 500,000 to 700,000 euros, but that the construction of the low-demand center for the homeless be ruled out, something that means for this formation "none the agreements with us and with the associations". Rojas has also branded the item for employment as "ridiculous": from 650,000 euros for the business accelerator in the Telefónica building, "which is not executed", to more than 30,000 euros for employment courses.
The other vision of the budgets has been given by the municipal government by the councilor for the Presidency and Economic Development, the socialist Conrado Rodríguez, who has defended tooth and nail the benefits of some accounts that increase social coverage, allocate up to 2 .6 million to improve infrastructure and sanitation and, among other things, contemplate an unprecedented investment of 800,000 euros for schools.
Rodríguez has assured that the opposition's arguments, in addition to being "demagogic", point to "cuts" and "another adjustment plan". Faced with this, he said, "this government is committed to a growth budget, which is committed to improving the city and the quality of life of citizens."