By C. S. G.
The mayors, urban planning representatives and technicians from the seven municipalities of the island left the meeting with exactly the same ideas they had entered with. The drafter of the Special Territorial Plan, Fernando Prats, failed to convince any of them about the convenience of not including the complementary leisure offer, and leaving it for a later document. The seven municipal leaders demanded substantial modifications to the document presented by councilor Carlos Espino, including the mayor of Tías, José Juan Cruz Saavedra, who continues to be the dissonant and rebellious voice within the PSOE on this issue.
"We have once again made our approach regarding the land needed to launch the renovation of the accommodation plant, and land is needed not only to add to that renovation, but also for a series of services that we need in the tourist area, also for residents, such as green spaces and roads, about which we have once again expressed our concern, as well as about the complementary leisure offer," said Cruz Saavedra after that meeting.
The mayor stressed that "there are issues that affect the municipality of Tías that are not reflected" in the current PTE document, and "therefore we state that they have to be included", because otherwise, "if that document does not include what the General Plan of the municipality, recently approved, contemplates, we will not be able to finalize its adaptation to the Guidelines".
"I don't know who is going rogue in the PSOE; I am defending the interests of the municipality of Tías," added the mayor, who in turn demanded that the PTE "solve the tourist problems of the municipality".
"Does not meet expectations"
For her part, the mayor of Arrecife, María Isabel Déniz, said after the meeting that "the general feeling is that this document does not meet the expectations that were raised from the different City Councils", while highlighting that Prats "made a philosophical exposition of what the objective of the PTE was, what was intended and what the tourist situation is currently and where we want to go, but with that model that is being proposed, none of those expectations were met".
In turn, the mayor of Arrecife argued that in the process of drafting the PTE "there has not been a connection so that the things that the mayors and their technicians had raised were reflected", and considered that this is due "perhaps to the fact that the drafter already had a certain model, or thought that this was a phase and then another one could be done".
María Isabel Déniz also considered that "we are doing a disservice to the municipality of Arrecife" with this Plan, and advocated that the PTE be reformulated "between the drafting team and the technical experts from the different City Councils, to decide what formula is the appropriate one".
Jesús Machín, very unhappy
Even more critical was the mayor of Tinajo, Jesús Machín, who said that he left Saturday's meeting "very unhappy, for my municipality and for Lanzarote. The presentation made by Fernando Prats was telling all the negative things that tourism is in Spain, it seems especially in the Canary Islands, and how badly it is going in Lanzarote, but my surprise was when no alternatives are presented, no solutions are presented, a feasibility study on what we have to rectify. It seems that the solution is in saying no to certain things, so I left unhappy at a general level and it seems that it has been the feeling of everyone".
In what Machín says he has achieved a positive response to his demands is on the issue of the Isleta de La Santa and the land classification. "Carlos Espino told me that they had gone too far in the tourist urban land that the PTE's Memory includes, that it had been a mistake and it will be rectified, and I hope that it will be so and remain in accordance with the BIC, which is how it has to be. Afterwards, I do not agree with the unconsolidated urban land that he puts in the Isleta, because what it has to be, and the Cabildo has the opportunity, is that it remains declassified. Espino tells me that the PTE does not have the powers to declassify land, and at that moment both the mayor of Tías and the technician of that municipality responded, saying how it is possible that they do not declassify land in Tinajo, and in Tías they declassified it; I do not understand it".
Machín also stated emphatically that the PTE "must include the complementary leisure offer", and highlighted in this regard his "confidence in the goodwill of the president of the Cabildo to ensure compliance, as she said, that this document comes out by consensus".
Teguise, the most participatory
The representatives of the municipality of Teguise were the most participatory in Saturday's meeting. The deputy mayor and councilor for Urban Planning, Domingo Cejas, expressed his desire that "the situation can be redirected", because "I consider that this is not a closed document, we are in time to modify it, and that is why this work schedule has been made, so that everyone knows the document and then enrich it".
On the other hand, Cejas considered that councilor Carlos Espino should "recognize that he was wrong about what he suggested to us to include in the agreement with Algol to change the land use of the Costa Teguise golf course for the construction of a 500-bed hotel, or two 300-bed hotels". And he added: "I regret that Espino does not assume his responsibility, because he made an approach and now he says that that approach is wrong".
On the other hand, Cejas pointed out that the PTE "has the capacity to collect many things that it does not collect, and we must take advantage of it, to make it a powerful instrument. It is a document that can be improved, and it must be done".
