Natural, crushed or combined with the ashes of the La Palma volcano. That is the question: choosing what type of sand is the most suitable for regenerating San Marcos beach, “the jewel in the crown” of Icod de los Vinos. Its mayor, Francis González, considers that citizens have to take a position on this matter and for this reason announced yesterday that he will hold a popular consultation, with prior authorization from the Government of Spain, and to take this proposal to the municipal plenary session.
The decision was adopted after the head of the public company Gestur confirmed that the environmental impact studies to regenerate the beach with natural sand, the alternative that the Government of CC-Cs always defended, “will take a while” and that contemplate the crushing.
Accompanied by his entire government team, González reviewed the latest steps taken with this coastal space, which is being regenerated due to the deterioration suffered in recent years due to the successive losses of sand caused by storms.
Thus, he recalled that on November 29, 2021 he received a WhatsApp message from the Director of Tourist Infrastructure of the Government of the Canary Islands informing him that he had received a favorable response from Costas requesting the construction project after the plenary agreement of May of that same year.
“In it, it was agreed to initiate the procedures and seek financing channels in order to immediately carry out the recharge of natural sand with the existing natural sandbank outside the area called the large dock or with the banks of natural sand of the Island closest to the beach in such a way that as soon as possible it begins to recharge with natural sand”, specified González.
However, on February 4, the CEO of Gestur and general secretary of the Icodense Socialists, Juan Miguel Martín Zarza, Juan Miguel Martín Zarza, explained to him in an informal meeting that the sand was crushed, as confirmed later the engineer Emilio Grande, who participated in the project entrusted to Gesplan. The latter added that this alternative had been proposed following the requirements of Costas and given that the environmental impact studies would take some time, and he also told him that the possibility of using the ash from the La Palma volcano was being studied.
The mayor was convinced that “the project to recover the natural sand is viable and possible, but it is used that the environmental studies will take time to impose the crushing.”
For this reason, he assured that “he has no other option” than to propose to the Plenary to request the Government of Spain authorization to hold a popular consultation and if it is not granted, to use other mechanisms to know the opinion of the Icodenses.
Due to the fact that “there are very few examples in the Spanish constitutional democratic history of popular consultations in town halls and there is uncertainty about the times and the way to approach it”, the Town Hall commissioned the Department of Constitutional Law of the University of La Laguna (ULL) to carry out a report in which some issues related to the legal terms in which the request must be made to obtain authorization are determined.
