The “strong” mandate began. A truck overturned on the coast of the municipality, termites… After a year of relative calm, a political crisis arose with the PSOE and he continued in the Mayor’s seat despite the fact that his replacement was scheduled for two years. He acknowledges that his mandate has been hard and complicated but at the same time satisfactory, being able to verify that we have been able to be up to the task of resolving major crises but without the citizens suffering for it. Therefore, he has not hesitated to run again as a candidate for Nueva Canarias (NC).
-Nueva Canarias has had a quiet mandate. What was the reason for Leticia Díaz’s resignation at the last minute?
“Leticia López has only resigned from the Youth area, while the rest of her government responsibilities are exercised with absolute normality. Regarding Nueva Canarias in Tacoronte, I can only say that she is still strong and cohesive ”.
-You have had to show your face for the expansion project of the TF-5. Why didn’t the Town Planning councilor do it?
“That would have to be asked of him. For me, what worries me is how the third lane of the Autopista del Norte is intended to be executed, because it is not that I am against it, but rather that I believe that the development of the TF5, as it has been proposed, conditions absolutely the existence of neighborhoods like Los Naranjeros and La Luz. In addition, I believe that the project proposed by the Canarian Government’s Department of Public Works proposes accesses that are insufficient and that will make entering or leaving Tacoronte hell. The third lane cannot be allowed, instead of serving to unite the municipality, to split us even more in two and deepen the scar that the original road already gave us in the 1960s, separating the upper and lower parts of the municipality.” .
-Did you come to regret your position after some criticism from other political spheres?
“Absolutely. As mayor, I believe that I always have to be on the side of my neighbors and I have to make it clear to them that I am with them for whatever they need. Those who turn their backs on their neighbors or try to find the easy photo to later betray the same people they have used will have to repent.
-In this sense, do you have the support of the neighbors?
“I think I have the support of the residents in this, since, as the execution of the third lane of the TF-5 is proposed, it negatively affects the connections of such important neighborhoods as Agua García and Barranco Las Lajas, in the upper part, or Camino la Cuesta, in addition to conditioning sustainable urban mobility and the commercial potential of neighborhoods such as La Luz, Los Naranjeros, Waque or El Cantillo”.
-The General Planning Plan has been postponed. What are the causes?
“We have made the decision to gradually assume specific planning modifications, so that they are allocated to specific areas, where we anticipate that there is no conflict, neither with the neighbors nor with the owners. For this reason, I have initiated proceedings as important as the conversion of the land adjacent to the Health Center for socio-sanitary and care use, in addition to a modification that allows the current bus station to be relocated, to allocate it to parking lots, leisure and commercial areas that go to enable the center of Tacoronte and La Estación to acquire and develop their full potential”.
What response have you obtained to your struggle to complete the expansion of the Health Center?
“I call every week and have requested meetings from the Canary Islands Health Service and the Ministry of Health and it is true that there have been certain political earthquakes that have conditioned the interlocutors, who have changed. I am still pressing, every day, because I believe that this work is a priority for Tacoronte, in the same way that in my electoral program I propose as a priority a Health Center in Agua García, in the upper part, which also serves Barranco Las Lajas ”.
-You said in 2020 that a traffic light was going to be installed to improve the safety of the users of the center, once the Cabildo confirmed that it was an insular competition. What has this project been?
“I keep asking the Cabildo daily for improvements in that section, which according to the Island Corporation, was its responsibility. We are still waiting for the work on the Health Center to be completed, which conditions a part of the internal movements in the La Estación area, in order to reorganize traffic in such a way that it is more efficient. Today it can be seen that the queues are less in this section, thanks to certain small modifications made by us”.
