The first Pilot experience for the elaboration of a participatory budget in the municipality of the orotavawhich has a population of just over 42,000 inhabitants, has resulted in 70 neighborhood proposals on new or improvement works and acquisition of equipment and inventoriable goods. for now, the town council has not wanted to make these proposals public because municipal technicians must assess them previously “to verify its technical, economic and legislative feasibility”. Once analyzed by the competent areas in each case, they will be made known so that the public can vote on those they consider to be a priority.
The Citizen Participation area, which directs Delia Escobar (DC), has had the collaboration of the Factoría Social Association for this process, in charge of coordinating this pilot experience of participatory budgeting. This first edition was addressed, above all, to old people, young people between the ages of 16 and 20and representatives of companies and shops of the Villa. Members of these groups have been the protagonists of “a community process and careful listening to local needs, during which 70 project proposals have been collected to be evaluated in the next phase of technical validation.”
This first phase has included fifteen sector and territorial meetings, which have included visits to associations in different neighborhoods of the municipality, the Casa de la Juventud, the Municipal Center for the Elderly, the Polígono San Jerónimo or the IES la Orotava, among others. For the mayor, Francisco Linares (CC)we must value the work that has been carried out in recent months, «which makes La Orotava a one of the few municipalities in Canary Islands that is beginning to take steps, small but important, to count on citizen participation when drawing up budgets”. In Linares’s opinion, it is “a new opportunity for the neighborhood to participate in the public management of the municipality.”
In order to develop this project a regulation has been approved; technical advice is available from the different municipal departments, and the collaboration of the representatives of the different political groups that make up the municipal Corporation.
After collecting the 70 neighborhood proposals, the a second phase, which will last 30 calendar days, so that the technicians can determine which initiatives should be discarded as unfeasible. After this study, the projects will be announced so that citizens can choose in a vote. The chosen projects will be executed in the next 2023charged to the municipal budget, which has reserved part of the investment chapter for this purpose.
Delia Escobar He acknowledges that “both for the administration and for the public it is a new experience”, although he considers that “this first phase has had very good results”. This year, participation has focused on the three aforementioned sectors (elderly, young people and businessmen), but the municipal intention is that “any resident of the municipality can participate to consolidate a project that allows, among all, to continue improving the quality of life of the residents and visitors of La Orotava».
Social Factory It also highlights “the good reception that the project has had and the involvement of all the participating people”. In his opinion, “it has been an intense community process, visiting places and listening to local needs during which the participants They have been able to meet to reflect on the municipality and propose improvement projects jointly and by consensus».
