Mayor Update

Attended the Remembrance day service at the church in Zurgena yesterday. Felt sorry for Mick Gardiner and his team as the priest could not attend, due to an emergency, but they managed very well. There was a good turnout and I attended with Candido (representing PA) and Sampo (representing PP). Received an update on Kiko's state of treatment. He has had to have 3 titanium plates inserted in his arm and shoulders, which shows the severity of the injuries he sustained.

I have been contacting a number of people whose names were sent by the Junta to confirm they are still owners of or residents of property entitled to be on the padron. A few who I was unable to speak to directly I left messages on their phones. So if you get a garbled message from me it was probably just asking you to call into the Town Hall with passprot or NIE to confirm that you should still be on the padron. One name I was unable to contact was Leonard Mason of Calle Narciso. If you know Mr Mason please ask him to pop into the TH.

Mayors Accident

I am indebted to Linda and Dave Lewis for the following information. I have confirmed the following with the Town Hall
Apparently late yesterday morning our Mayor, Kiko, together with another worker, were using a cherry picker to deal with signage and as they were working at some height, the cherry picker basket itself became detached from the crane and fell to the ground. both Kiko and Anthonio (a PP member) were seriously injured and an air ambulance attended the scene. It was there for 45 minutes before lifting them to Almeria Hospital where they are both said to be comfortable. Kiko has numerous cuts to his head it is suspected that he has broken both his arms. They have had to operate on his elbow. Anthonio has a badly broken ankle.
Will keep you posted on how he is doing.

Dirty Dog (owners)

I and the Town Hall are receiving an increasing number of complaints regarding people walking their dogs and allowing them to defecate in areas close to private houses. There is in existence in Spain a bye law which means that anyone found allowing their dog to do so attracts a fine of between €50 and €150.
It is not that we do not have enough problems with feral dogs but, for individuals to fail to pick up their dogs mess, is exceedingly thoughtless and of course also give rise to potential health issues.

Please, if you walk your dogs in or near any houses,  pick up any mess your dog makes and dispose of it in the basuras. It is not asking much and enhances our areas of residence.

Lights and bits

Candido is (as councillor for Public Works) working his way through the list of street lights not working and a few areas have already been completed. In some cases it is down to the installing company and others the T.H. but there are still some areas not yet formally adopted which are in the responsibility of the original builder.
Whilst I was in the Town Hall doing some work on Thursday I discovered that the fist of the acceptance letters (for IBI) from the Diputacion have been received by some residents. This is earlier than we had thought but it is good to know that they are now processing the files.
I am now aware that Partido Populare have appointed two coordinators to act as liaison between the expat community and our new Mayor and there party. They are John Hare 697255644 and Nicola Blade 666023776. I assume that their role will be to facilitate issues between the expat community and PP and our new Mayor.
I will continue to report as a council member and assist in the same way as the past 4 years but you may feel that certain issues are better directed to the PP coordinators. To assist you in deciding who best to contact it may help if I list the roles performed by PA in the coalition, we hold the offices responsible for Public Works (Candido) Social and Sports etc (Noelia) 3rd Age (myself) and Salvadore (having completed the work on compiling the IBI files) is now responsible for one of the most important roles. He has to sign off payments with the Mayor.
All other issues eg Galasa, Planning etc are the responsibility of PP councillors.
As usual any queries just let me know.

Cuesta de los Pinos Court Case

Anthonio of New Horizons was keen for me to call into his office today to collect a copy of the court ruling from the Appeal Court in Granada.


The court ruling is one I have referred to before but, I think Anthonio wanted me to publicise the fact that the case, regarding the 63 building licences granted by the Town Hall of Zurgena on 16.02.07, 28.10.04, 3.02.05, 10.2.05, 30.4.05, 7.10.05 and 18.2.06 were won by the Town Hall for various reasons. Additionally the costs of the appeal were awarded against the Junta de Andalucia. I have a copy of the court ruling if anyone wishes to view it. No appeal is known to have been lodged against this ruling and as it was in June time has expired for such an action.

Bits 28th October

Had a meeting with Candido this morning for about an hour to go over some things. It was fine at first as I had Andreas interpreting, however, as he had a lot of work to do prior to him starting a months holiday, Sampo took over.

I first asked about the pavement being built at Cuesta de los Pinos. Candido confirmed that the paving would extend from Calle Francia for 500 metres north along the east side of Avenida Europa. It will not, in the near future extend to the south.

I asked if they could take down all the Political Election signs as they are becoming an eyesore for many. They agreed to do that in the next few weeks.

I did praise him for the work done on the entrance to Zurgena as it looked greatly improved with the work already done and many people had conveyed their appreciation of this work.

I again raised the issue of the deterioration  of the road through Cucador by the big illegal house. He said that he would need to speak with Kiko as he, as Mayor, would need to send a letter to them telling them to put it right otherwise the Town Hall would have to do it and bill them the cost.

I raised the issue of the potholes in Avenida Palaces where it as temporarily repaired prior to their fiesta last year. He informed me that a project for the resurfacing of this road has been approved but due to budget constraints he could not say that it would be completed before the end of the year more likely early next year.

I provided Candido (again) with a list of the streets which do not have street signs on

Cuesta de los Pinos, 

Calle Moldavia, Calle Hungria,Calle Austria, Calle Latvia, Calle Grecia, Calle Bulgaria, Calle Letonia, Calle Islandia,

Los Llanos  

Avenida Poetas, Calle Nicolas Salmeron, Calle Pedro Salinas, Calle Juan Ramon Jimenez 

Los Carasoles

Calle Nalon, Calle Segura, Calle Odiel

La Alfoquia 

Avenida de Aracena y Picos de Aroche,

Cucador

Calle Montinegro, 

Los Cabreras

Avenida Los Cabreras, 

If you know of any other streets without signs please let me know so that I can add them to the list. I suspect that we will need to reorder the signs for those streets.

There was no further news on any court cases.

I asked for clarification of the IBI situation for people without Licences of 1st Occupation and I was told that where the Town Hall could justify that a property had been built, stood and occupied for more than 4 years they would be asked to pay the 4 years. This would include people with Certificates of Antiquity. Sorry if I misled people it was not intentional it was my misunderstanding of the situation. 

As you may have noticed in the first paragraph Andreas is not going to be about much for the next month or two. He is starting a period of 4 weeks holidays and then shortly after he returns his wife is due to give birth and he will have another 15 days holidays paternity leave.

As usual any queries or issues please just drop me an email.

Pleno 25th Oct, & Earthquake

Called into the Town Hall this morning and discovered that there was a Pleno at midday. Apparently the Polizia Local thought I was still in the UK and so I was unaware.

It was a pretty boring Pleno. The main purpose being to approve a pig farm near Almajalejo which was unanimously approved. Unfortunately the PSOE party spent the first 45 minutes complaining that they felt that Isa (stand in Town Hall Secretary) was not accurately recording minutes of the meetings. A point which I felt was unfair as Isa has shown to be very unbiased in all her dealings over the year.  Also this is a point which can be argued after any type of meeting. The meetings are recorded and these are available and we have even reached the digital age with a new digital recorder rep;lacing our old cassette tape recorder! The other points in the meeting were quite dry. Due to the meeting taking 2 hours I have arranged to see Candido later in the week to discuss the other outstanding issues.

On my way into town I was pleased to see the extent to which the Town Hall has improved the approach to Zurgena from La Alfoquia. They have cleared the area of all the rubbish from the VP housing at the top of the hill, inset the name of the town and made it all much more tidy. When you think that this was one of the points that came highest up the list on our survey in January of this year you can see that we have had an effect.

The Town Hall has also commenced work on paving one side of Avenida Europa/ As I understand it when completed it should reach from the lowest entry to Cuesta de los Pinos up to Calle Finlandia on the one side of the road and will have planting.

Earthquake. Those of you who woke up at about 1.30am, probably, are aware that we had a sizeable earthquake. According to the Spanish website which covers such events it was variously reported as being between 3.7 and 4.1 on the richter scale with the epicentre 2 kms nNE of Zurgena. It fairly shook the doors of my house!