The La Orotava City Council, led by the Canarian Coalition, has approved a motion to classify the municipality as a stressed area, as proposed by the Housing Law. Although the nationalist party voted in the Congress of Deputies against said Law because it considered it “electoralist”, it is now promoting it in the northern municipality of Tenerife due to high rental prices.
The Canary Islands are a paradise with high tourism figures in which it is increasingly difficult to access housing. Municipalities such as Adeje, Arona, Granadilla de Abona, Puerto de La Cruz or La Orotava are some of the most stressed on the island of Tenerife. Avoiding gentrification and stressed areas was one of the reasons why the Housing Law was created. However, the Canarian Coalition considered in April that the reasons for approving said Law were “electoralist” and called it “nonsense.”
The then deputy for the Canary Coalition, Ana Oramas, criticized Pedro Sánchez for wanting to approve the Law urgently and pointed out that this measure was not going to be useful to improve the housing situation on the islands: “It will not solve the serious problem of access to housing that thousands of citizens in the Canary Islands and in Spain have today.”
Furthermore, last summer, the regional Government of CC and PP announced that it was appealing the Housing Law before the Constitutional Court, but did not do so because thought August was a “non-working” month and the deadline expired.
A very different position from the one that the nationalist party now maintains in the municipality of La Orotava, since the party approved in the plenary session on October 30 a motion to “prepare the declaration of La Orotava as a tense area in terms of housing.” ”. The motion, which was approved unanimously by all groups in the plenary session, specifies the declaration of the municipality as a stressed area and the drafting “by the competent Administration, of a specific plan that will propose the necessary measures to correct the imbalances evidenced.” in its statement, as well as a development schedule.”
The Councilor for Social Welfare and person in charge of the Housing area, María Belén González, who did not want to give statements to Canarias Ahora, explained last Monday in statements to The day the following: “We know perfectly well the serious problems that people from Orotava face in getting a house. For this reason, the government group supported the motion to declare the municipality a stressed residential area. There is hardly any rental offer, what exists is through the roof and I no longer tell you how the mortgages are.”
“The truth is that the Canarian Coalition’s change of position on this issue does not surprise me. At the local level they refuse to take measures because they say they do not have the power to do so, but then they remove this issue and urge the government to take measures to stop prices,” says María Jesús Alonso Hernández, councilor of the Socialist Party in the municipality of The Orotava.
Hernández adds: “In the Socialist Party we are in favor of a regulation so that there are no exorbitant prices and that citizens are not expelled in quotation marks from the area of the town, there are many families that either only have one income in the family or who end up selling or resorting to vacation rentals.” The councilor explains that the PSOE also considered taking measures with the rents of the municipality’s commercial premises: “They told us that this was interventionism, there are many premises with exorbitant rents, SMEs, small businesses that contribute to the commercial fabric, this also affects to the creation of jobs. “It’s all about sitting down and talking, you can look for solutions.”
Collectives
“From the Claim Encampment, when the Housing Law was announced, we positioned ourselves against it. The Housing Law burdens the owner with a series of inconveniences, in a market that is free and what causes it is that the owner either wants to sell or dedicate himself to vacation rentals. It will not serve to lower prices,” says Eloy Cuadra, spokesperson for the platform. Lolo Dorta Claim Camping.
“The Law does not legislate on vulture funds, it does not mention vacation rentals or trial and withdrawal. It may serve to encourage other town councils, that the Canarian Coalition, which voted against, has realized the problem is one more example that the problem is very serious. The Law can serve to pressure, as a trigger, but it has to be the autonomous communities that have to legislate, which are the ones that have powers,” highlights Eloy Cuadra.
Concern about stressed areas also occurs on the island of Fuerteventura, where the platform SOS Sustainable Fuerteventura In October, in the plenary session of the Cabildo, he presented the proposal to adopt exceptional measures to improve the housing situation on the island.
Among the needs identified by the platform, which received the rejection of the agency, is the creation of public housing. Although the platform was rejected by the island organization in October, the regional councilor for Public Works, Housing and Mobility, Pablo Rodríguez, highlighted at the beginning of November his commitment to the island of Fuerteventura and the collaboration of the Government of the Canary Islands with the Cabildo of Fuerteventura. for the construction of public housing.
