"I'm very happy." That's how Tanausú Hernández, the 27-year-old from Arrecife who suffered quadriplegia in 2010 and until now had barely been able to go outside because he lived on a second floor without an elevator in Valterra, says he feels. Now, after seven years and a long struggle by his family, Tana has finally managed to have an elevator installed in the building and go out freely and without help from his home.
"This morning I arrived at the house and Tana was just coming out of the elevator. It was very big, a very emotional moment," the Podemos councilor in Arrecife, Leticia Padilla, told La Voz, whom the young man asked for help in 2016, after spending two years requesting permission from the City Council to install an elevator on the facade of his home. And it is that, after Tana suffered an accident in August 2010 "when diving headfirst into the water on a beach in Costa Teguise", which left him in a wheelchair, his life was practically reduced to the four walls of his room because, to leave the house, he required help as he did not have an elevator.
"Imagine a kid of this age locked in a room, unable to go out or in or lead a normal life with his friends. In addition, the issue of doctors and rehabilitation came up, because of course, not being able to go out, he couldn't go swimming either, which is what the doctors recommended to recover a little mobility, he couldn't go to rehabilitation, he didn't have the massages his body needed and he gained a lot of weight by not being able to move. It was a combination of things that the poor guy has had a terrible time," says Padilla.
The City Council denied permission because a neighbor opposed it
The Podemos councilor in Arrecife recalls that "the City Council denied permission because the downstairs neighbor did not sign the document that they needed from the community to be able to put the elevator on the facade, which had to be installed on the facade because the Technical Office said that inside it was impossible", and that they had been "fighting for two years" like that. "Finally I contacted a lawyer and, thanks to her, we obtained a legal report that said that no one could prevent anyone from having normal mobility and that the neighbor's signature was not really necessary to obtain the building permit and in the end we got that permit," says Leticia Padilla.
But after obtaining the license from the City Council, a fact that was achieved in June of this year, money was lacking for its installation. And it is that, Tanausú Hernández had received subsidies from the capital's City Council, the Cabildo, and the Government of the Canary Islands "for a total of 11,000 euros", but it was "insufficient", points out the Podemos councilor in Arrecife. "Because apart from the elevator, it was also necessary to pay for a technical project, it was necessary to do the work, prepare the facade, there was waste management, many things that were not taken into account when giving the first subsidy, and money was lacking," details Leticia Padilla, who recalls that finally, in October, the Cabildo approved a second subsidy of 12,000 euros for the installation of the elevator in Tana's home, which has finally become a reality.
"He hasn't stopped since the weekend"
"They finished installing it on Friday at 11 p.m. and he hasn't stopped since then. On the weekend he went to the supermarket with his mother, to walk with his nephews, and this morning he was going up and down," said the Podemos councilor in Arrecife, who also feels "happy" to have managed to get Tana to go out freely on the street.