First of all, I want to introduce myself to those who don't know me. My name is Sheila Guillén Duarte, I am 32 years old, and my family origins, upbringing and youth are linked to the neighborhood of Maneje. I studied at the Santa María de los Volcanes School and had my daughters at the Dr. Molina Orosa Hospital. As you can see, my vital path always begins in Arrecife.
Because Arrecife is more than an urban environment of 64,000 inhabitants. It is more than its neighborhoods, its streets or its coastline. Arrecife is the beginning and the end of the lives of most of the citizens of this island of Lanzarote. The circle that closes. The points that touch. A vital environment. Arrecife, in short, is Lanzarote and Lanzarote cannot be understood without Arrecife.
Most of the people of Lanzarote were born in Arrecife.
We have developed thanks to its economic activity; we have used its public services; we have met diverse people from other parts of the world. Arrecife has united us as an island people, but it has also connected us with the world.
That is why, from the recently constituted Local Committee of Nueva Canarias-Bloque Canarista in Arrecife, we believe that it is worth laying the foundations to design and build a friendly city that takes care of its residents and visitors. To design the living room of that island-home that we all imagine and gives life to the Nueva Canarias project in Lanzarote and La Graciosa.
We are not talking about pharaonic works. We are talking about enabling the minimum urban infrastructures for a society that is no longer that of the last century, but faces important climate and social justice challenges. We experienced it a few days ago with the rains or a few years ago with the pandemic.
Urban infrastructures such as universal mobility. A city that is not an obstacle for pedestrians. Today, Arrecife does not take care of pedestrians, but displaces them in favor of the increasingly countless cars. A universal mobility with wide sidewalks, pedestrian biocalles and an inclusive perspective.
Arrecife is worthwhile because adaptation to climate change is urgent. Just two months ago we experienced an intense heat wave. School classes were canceled and the children could not go to schools and institutes because they were not equipped for high temperatures. But Arrecife is not either. We must move towards a city that protects those who live here from extreme weather conditions. Trees, shade areas, climate shelters such as Socio-Cultural Centers or libraries. In short, we are talking about designing not only urban but also social infrastructures.
It is worth planning in another way. We have been talking about the General Plan for decades. And we all know why it is not moving forward. Business and political interests that leave the city paralyzed
and an administration without management capacity.
We must shed the bureaucratic vision of the last century where planning was based on a document that carries a tremendous burden of time and bureaucracy, and that does not adapt to the needs of a changing society like today's.
We must go to an open, participatory and dynamic model. Arrecife needs planning instruments that truly solve the problems and needs of citizens at all times. Models such as Strategic Plans or Urban Agendas that are already established models in Europe can solve the entrenched and obsolete model of current urban plans. From Nueva Canarias Arrecife we will insist a lot on this throughout this legislature.
Arrecife and Lanzarote have a challenge to face. Access to housing is becoming an increasing anguish, especially among young people who want to become independent. The lack of housing, the low purchasing power and the high cost of rents make it impossible to access housing and create a home for those of us who want to continue living here.
Arrecife must not only provide land for the construction of public housing such as those being built in Maneje, but also declare the city a "stressed area" so that speculation and high prices can be stopped. We must also be brave in the possibility of stopping the purchase of homes by foreigners not resident in Lanzarote,
because what is causing prices to rise and the few houses are left in the hands of people who do not reside on the island most of the year. To build a home, we must have a home. Our lives depend on it.
It is worth building an Arrecife identity. And it is not about looking in the past for the port sentiment. It is about Arrecife being another Arrecife, and we must adapt and evolve to a
diverse, multiple and integrating identity. Arrecife has the greatest diversity of foreign nationalities in Lanzarote. And I say live, not coexist. Because the public authorities have renounced multinational integration. The participation of the various nationalities in public affairs has not been of interest.
This lack of integration in the city, in the common, creates closed communities that are self-managed outside of politics. We must build a town. The Arrecife identity of the
21st century is yet to be built. It is the responsibility of all of us to make multinational integration the engine of the new civic and cultural coexistence of Arrecife. With this will come public exemplarity and the care of our environment among all. And political participation. A Colombian, Venezuelan, Mauritanian or Hindu person must participate in politics and must also represent that part of a whole called Arrecife.
And it is worth participating in politics. Politics is the tool that this society has to participate in a democratic way. Even if we are angry and frustrated. Even if we think it is not worth it. Even if it is hard and laborious, politics will always be the best way to transform the lives of our people.
Nueva Canarias-Arrecife begins its journey learning from the past, but with a clear idea of a city that cares, egalitarian, safe, equitable, clean, with social justice, friendly, sustainable, breathable, integrating. In short, a capital for the island-home that we dream of.
Sheila Guillén Duarte is the Spokesperson for the Local Committee of NC-BC in Arrecife.
