The Vice President and Minister of Finance, Román Rodríguez, visited the town of Arafo on Tuesday, touring its Auditorium and the Regional Winery, among other facilities, to fulfill the invitation made by the mayor of this municipality, Juan Ramón Martín. He showed his commitment to continue with the line of collaboration, since he will undertake new projects in this Tenerife town.
Rodríguez stressed that his obligation as Vice President of the Government is to “tour the Archipelago and connect with the municipalities and their people. I had a meeting with the mayor in September 2020, at a critical moment, and then we allocated 500,000 euros for sanitation and another 200,000 euros to improve the clean-up of the coast.”
Along these lines, he remarked that Arafo “is financially healthy after overcoming a very difficult stage, but he continues to have problems. Some are common with other municipalities in the Canary Islands, such as those that have to do with sanitation and water for human consumption. Then there is a primary sector that needs protection. It also has cultural facilities that are unique, but are deteriorated. And it also has infrastructure needs for the future.” Regarding sanitation, the vice president of the regional Executive said that it is “one of the pending issues that we have in too many places in the Archipelago and we need a shared strategy between the Government, councils and municipalities. We are going to see the room for maneuver that we have, because right now there is room for only partial amendments to the Budgets, but we will make a gesture with Arafo, similar to the one we made in 2021, so that this municipality resolves the problems it has both in the primary sector as well as sanitation and energy infrastructure”.
The mayor, for his part, thanked Román Rodríguez for his interest “in knowing the reality of our municipality, which is emerging from a complicated situation, although we continue to take steps to improve it. We have let the vice president know that, with his own resources, we cannot cover the needs we have. Thanks to his management, we have managed to increase the percentage of sanitation, ”said Martín, after a visit to the Regional Winery and the Casa de la Miel.
Finally, he stressed the interest “in carrying out the project that would provide the municipality with a library, archive and study room.”
