The candidate of People’s Party (PP) to the La Laguna City HallAna Zurita, has been developing, since the announcement of her candidacy, an intense agenda of meetings with neighbors and the associative fabric of the municipality to gather their needs and finish setting up the program that will lead to the elections on May 28, and that It will consider measures such as “establishing low-tax zones with tax incentives for job creation”, in addition to others focused on housing, security or young people, and four challenges for La Laguna that it advanced in its presentation act as a candidate, last Saturday .
-How is the work being since the announcement of your candidacy?
“In these two months that we have been going, we have visited almost all the towns and neighborhoods of La Laguna and met with neighbors and a large part of the associative fabric to listen to their problems and see what we could incorporate into the program, especially those that require an imminent solution. , apart from the big problems of La Laguna. The truth is that for us it has been a long-distance race, without haste but without pause, because what we wanted was, after Easter, when the kick-off of the campaign begins, to have the proposals and come up with a project for La Laguna as consensual as possible.
-And in these meetings, what are the most urgent needs that are being conveyed to you?
“There are several things that are fundamental, for example, there is a big problem in La Laguna with respect to projects to generate economy and employment, because everyone complains about insecurity, lack of transparency, excessive processing times in the City Hall, that there is no activity planned in any way. And another problem that they refer to us is public safety, it is a fundamental complaint, and of the Local Police itself, and it is a pressing problem to be resolved in the City Council. The other day we saw how it was announced that the building of the old San Benito station was going to be the new headquarters of the Local Police, but this does not solve the problems of security or the police themselves, changing their headquarters, but rather deep reforms must be undertaken in the organization and in the services provided to residents. And another priority issue that the neighbors also bring to us are the deficiencies in public transport. Apart from the detailed issues that each neighborhood and town may have, which we also have categorized”.
-You talk about generating economy and employment, how do you think companies should be helped?
“We have two options for that. The first is planning, it is necessary to review the instruments that refer, above all, to the beginning of an activity and then the diversity of documents that exist to establish, for example, an activity in the historical complex. Imminent work must be done in the development of regulations for administrative streamlining. And another measure that we are contemplating is the establishment of low tax areas with tax incentives for job creation, which can be geographically located in one place or also respond to specific sectors or activities and employment incentives for certain groups, such as young people, vulnerable people… We intend to solve this lack of economic areas and employment, while we solve the lack of services that may exist in a certain place”.
-And what is your housing policy?
“One of the main factors behind the housing shortage in the municipality is the lack of supply, and it is clear that activating the PGO is essential because it would lay the ground to implement not only housing for young people, but social and affordable housing in general. Right now in La Laguna there are about three million square meters of developable land that could house up to 15,000 homes. And we intend to establish areas of opportunity where there is more demand, with incentives, with low-tax areas, with areas where there is a qualification of young housing and that has a general plan modification procedure and preferential administrative processing if it comes to resolving areas of houses where they are needed. Then also encourage the rehabilitation areas and continue with the processes that are already underway, which we have already denounced, these days, that there are some of which the municipal government has forgotten, such as the case of Princess Yballa or El Cardonal ”.
-In her presentation as a candidate, last Saturday, she spoke of four challenges…
“The program will be encompassed in four lines in which we are going to develop all the measures, with young people as a priority. These four lines are to recover the prominence of La Laguna in the metropolitan area, and for that we are going to develop fundamental measures for job creation, economics, mobility…; the second line will deal with how to recover the balance between the center and the neighborhoods and towns; the third will be to reinvent urban planning and action models, and the fourth will be the housing strategy”.
