The improvement of playgrounds has been the most voted proposal by citizens among those presented to the participatory budgets of San Bartolomé for this year 2018, which will be endowed in the general budgets with an allocation of 200,000 euros.
The proposals were submitted to a vote once it was verified that they met the requirements, with a total of 522 votes cast. According to the votes obtained, the proposals were the following: improvement of playgrounds; improvement of the CEIP Ajei gymnasium; resurfacing of the interior road of CEIP Playa Honda, which is used as a playground and decorating it with floor games; improvement of public lighting in Playa Honda; conditioning of children's and primary school courts with shade areas of CEIP El Quintero; and the elimination of barriers, benches, shade area in Plaza Santa Elena and conditioning of the municipal multipurpose classrooms and community bathrooms.
Among the proposals was also the use of the surroundings of the Casa Mayor Guerra for the construction of athletics tracks, cycling, outdoor courts, etc.; the visor of the San Bartolomé Football Field, the installation of free Wi-Fi zone in Plaza Santa Elena, Calle Mayor and Avenida de Playa Honda; the installation of a dog park; the improvement of the sports court of the Colegio Infantil de Güime; the arrangement of the park in Plaza del Carmen; the improvement of the theater room, stage and video forum of the Playa Honda Civic Center; and the putting of a sidewalk on Calle Pérez Galdós.
Pioneer in the Canary Islands
From the City Council of San Bartolomé they remember that the Consistory was selected in 2017 as a model of participatory budgets in the Interadministrative Conference on Participation and Citizen Collaboration of the Canary Islands organized by the regional Executive. The Councilor for Economy and Finance, Antonio Rocío, also highlights that San Bartolomé has been the first city council in the Canary Islands "to put into operation a specialized software to support this action"
"We have been pioneers in the implementation of this system, it has worked, and therefore this year we have repeated the process with great success of participation and as a form of management. The neighborhood has responded to this process of creating a new space for participation, of involvement in which to talk about public money and investments, and of being part of the decision-making," the mayor highlighted.