Ten mayors demand 20,000 million euros of European funds for municipalities from the Government
New claim of the mayors to the Government of Pedro Sánchez. Ten councilors of all political colors, except for the PSOE, have agreed after a telematic meeting to ask the central Executive for more than 20,000 million euros of European funds for municipalities. It is 14.56% of the 140,000 million received by Spain, the equivalent in percentage of what the local administration contributes to public spending by the State, the mayors of Madrid and Zaragoza (PP), Cádiz, have justified in a joint statement (Adelante Cádiz ), Valencia (Compromís), Girona and Reus (JuntsxCat), Granada (Ciudadanos), Lleida (ERC), Torrelavega (PRC), Pamplona (UPN) and Santa Cruz de Tenerife (CC).
SOS of the municipalities: Almeida, Colau and five other mayors ask the Government to invest their remnants
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They ask for an "immediate" meeting with the Minister of Finance and Government spokesperson, María Jesús Montero, to "define access to European financing" and also "rethink state aid" to municipalities for recovery after the pandemic with a fund of reconstruction of 4,000 million and another to compensate the losses in the transport of another 1,000. The Executive has so far allowed all local administrations to spend the remaining treasury by lifting the spending restrictions that municipalities must adhere to since 2012, but no direct aid has yet entered.
Mayors have already made a common front in the first wave of the pandemic to urge the Government to allow them to dispose of the surplus. Now, meeting at the initiative of the first mayor of Zaragoza, Jorge Azcón, they demand more "prominence" in the "direct management" of European funds. In the Recovery Plan with which the Government is operating, the municipalities do not have a large presence and the proportion of aid that will go to local administrations has not yet been defined. "This aid is essential for municipalities to continue providing their public services and helping those who need it most during the current economic crisis," the consensus statement said.
Local administrations complain that the pandemic has created a "great financial hole to pay for public services." The municipalities with healthy accounts, however, have extraordinary resources to face the economic and social crisis.
The one in Madrid, for example, will be able to invest more than 200 million euros more, regardless of budgets, from the remaining treasury thanks to the relaxation of the spending rule. This corporation, led by José Luis Martínez-Almeida, has even lowered the IBI to all Madrid residents in a linear way, in addition to creating tax credits for the sectors hardest hit by the crisis, such as hotels and businesses.
