Primero Teguise focuses on the management of Ginés González at the head of the Local Police department in which, according to the island formation, "shortcomings and needs are dragging on, which is worrying that they will become chronic." "It never rains but it pours," begins Jonás Álvarez, councilor of the formation in the Teguise City Council. He continues saying that "surely Ginés González knows what I'm talking about, who also carries the Animal Welfare area, but if he doesn't know, we remind him: he has a police headquarters in the Villa that is not maintained, with damages and breakdowns in each unit".
Álvarez assures that "the facilities of the video surveillance cameras of the police units have been damaged for some time, which produces a decrease in the security of the premises, both exterior and interior, with wooden windows that are easy to manipulate and force, allowing anyone to access the units with the danger that this entails, especially in night shifts where we know that we are not exactly overflowing with police officers".
"But it doesn't end there: problems in the showers, dampness on the walls and lack of paint and waterproofing; small changing rooms without conditioning for lockers and personal belongings, reusing old lockers from 40 years ago; problems in the computer implementation, with old and obsolete computers and hardware and useless programming for the times, even with unlicensed software, which is ironic since it is a police station," concludes the councilor.
According to the formation, the furniture and office material "is old and patched up, and even the expendable material is scarce, or non-existent. There is a lack of updated records to carry out the most basic functions and action protocols on issues such as the custody of lost or seized objects and narcotic substances, with the officials themselves having to guard the elements in their armories, taking responsibility for them, clearly putting the chain of custody at stake. Even when there are stocks of forms, they are ineffective, such as the records that are used for police reports, which have stopped being self-copying, having to use photocopies or reformulate them by hand, doubling the intervention and administrative management time and being able to cause failures in the writing and making it invalid".
"For that in particular, it has been requested on many occasions that vehicles and agents be equipped with printers and tablets to speed up this work and that the incident is automatically recorded, as recommended by the Ministry of the Interior and all police unions," Álvarez points out, who also criticizes the state of the vehicle fleet," he continues.
"In 2023, six new vehicles were acquired with an investment of 363,533 euros, however, none are equipped with a detainee kit or, what is known as, a screen for the safe transfer of people and detainees, and there were many irregularities in the bidding process. Some of these cars are parked on the lower floor of the headquarters, dirty, unused and in an unpainted garage without a suitable floor that is being used as a warehouse. And even adding those cars, we only have 15 vehicles of different types and functions, some with an age of 22 years, such as some motorcycles with which services are performed, which are in dire conditions and being used with borrowed helmets that have not been tested for the service, since the police are not provided with helmets and motorcyclist uniforms," concludes the councilor.
"The deficiencies do not end only with the mobile park, but continue with the materials and equipment of the police force. Primero Teguise is aware that the new uniforms that were supposedly to be delivered at the end of January 2025, were partially delivered with much delay, and being at the end of April, they are still being received in a disorderly manner, with some agents having a new uniform, and others not, including accessories such as flashlights or belts. Even if we ask about weapons and defenses, there are also significant deficiencies," he says.
"We have verified that part of the weaponry is more than 20 years old, and even though the union has requested that it be updated, budget items are not being allocated for that. Our officials are demanding that the weaponry be updated to the new times, where CO2 weapons and rubber or pepper projectiles are used, which would greatly improve citizen security and that of the agents themselves in the event of intervention, and they have not obtained a response," Jonás Álvarez tells this media outlet.
PTG continues explaining that agents have been provided with defenses and shields for public order and citizen security, with which "they have to intervene in those conditions in countless events that require these elements, as well as in daily incidents, having to carry out the interventions with other means".
"For example, in the Costa Teguise carnivals we know that there were up to three brawls where the defenses had to be used to dissolve them, being used the extendable metal defenses, which are not suitable, since semi-rigid rubber ones are recommended," explains the councilor Álvarez, who insists on this deficiency: "if we are going to continue promoting Teguise as a place for events and festivities, all the more reason to have our Local Police prepared, and a budget item of 65,000 euros is derisory for our staff of officials".
"We would like to be able to give the sensation of a safe and orderly municipality, but for that we have to take our units and our officials seriously. They are in charge of our safety and order and we must live up to their needs. Meeting them is essential so that they can improve their service to Teguise. We owe it to both them and our neighbors," concludes Álvarez.
