Since its foundation in 2019, Defendamos Calpe has been part of the opposition in Calp together with the PSPV-PSOE and Compromís. Four years ago they obtained two representatives in the municipal corporation and this 2023 they will run again in the municipal elections of Calpina, claiming "another way of doing politics."
Its spokesman and candidate for mayor, Paco Quiles Zaragoza, has always been very critical of the Popular Party's management in his municipality, something that he continues to defend in this interview for LaMarinaAlta.com. We spoke with him to find out his point of view on the current Calp and what he wants for the town in the coming years.
ASK. Why do you think the residents of Calp have to vote for you to be the mayor of their municipality for the next 4 years?
ANSWER. Calpe needs people who transmit credibility and the ability to do things well. Brave people, whose sole objective is to improve the lives of all Calpinos, of all, without harming anyone, respecting our environment as a condition for all planned actions. At Defendamos Calpe we meet this profile.
We are close and honest, clear and transparent people. This is what Toni and I have shown, especially in these four years, without fear of anything. Always with a common goal, the well-being of all Calpinos and Calpinas. We are people who can be trusted and capable of making the best ideas come true. We have an ambitious and sustainable project, independent, with nothing that binds us more than the Calpinos, with relevant measures that everyone knows.
Calpe belongs to the people of Calpe and we will count on everyone to make decisions. We have no other aspirations than to defend Calp, because Calp belongs to its people, and if you want the town where you live to be better, you should vote for Defendamos Calpe.
There is another way of doing politics, different from what exists, we make a difference, we have shown it in these four years. People can trust us. We are not going to let you down.
Q. How do you assess the management of the government team carried out in the last 4 years?
R. The management of a government must contribute something differential with its management, making and promoting policies that suppose a positive evolution in the citizenship. This has not happened. They have limited themselves to managing the day to day of a town hall and that is not differential.
The Calp town hall has been operating for many years, obviously, and the day-to-day is resolved, with its complexity, from the municipal areas that already have the experience for it. The government has not contributed anything special, neither in the last 4 years, nor the last 8, nor the 12. If you have to call a councilor's personal phone number to have something solved constantly, it means that they have not solved anything, in fact , they keep the problem to feel useful and you should call them, but this hides an electoral objective. This councilor helps me, but if he always has to help you when there are 450 public employees in the town hall willing to help you, it's his job, something is wrong.
We must ask ourselves: "How has my life changed after 4,8,12 years of managing the popular party?" Something that is different, contrastable, better than other populations. There is nothing to highlight. They settle for small actions that they sell as great achievements, but they are nothing more than a daily routine done by others.
The debt repaid? Of course, they have raised taxes, and we have paid it together. What they should have done is use that money to solve important and urgent issues.
P. HOUSING. What do you propose to facilitate access to housing for the youngest and people with low incomes?
R. The city model sponsored by the PP, in which it only prioritizes the construction of houses to satisfy tourist demand, results in the deficiencies that you mention.
To resolve it, a review of the general urban planning plan must be carried out to reorder and prioritize the direction of our urban growth and thus be able to provide housing for young people. Besides, We propose the possibility that in all housing developments, whose size allows it, up to 30% of VPO be reserved to cover this demand.
On the other hand, our objective is to develop an effective economic policy that allows increasing the income of workers and businesses in order to have a greater capacity to assume prices of this type.
It is a two-pronged solution. First we will get spaces to reduce the price of housing and make it more accessible and, at the same time, increase the income of the neighbors to have greater spending capacity. This part is often forgotten. If we all earned more, it wouldn't be such a problem, but the management of the PP harms both the supply of housing for young people and their income.
Q. HEALTH. Calp only has one health center for its 24.000 inhabitants. Are you going to work to achieve the creation of a second health center?
R. As far as we know, this issue unfortunately depends on a concession that the PP itself proposed as a solution years ago, and this has not been the case. Our proposal for actions where we have no competition is clear. Do not deceive and be transparent with the public and explain who or who is responsible for this situation.
From there, we will constantly work with those responsible for these powers to establish an urgent solution. Being this a priority, like the issue of education, we will have weekly monitoring of all these issues to show results, of which we will offer the corresponding information to the public. Transparency and effectiveness.
Calpe has grown in such a disorderly way that the PP has forgotten to reserve spaces for things as necessary as a health center. The revision of the general plan that we intend to do is the solution to find and reserve spaces for these basic questions.
Q. EDUCATION. The same happens with the Institute, if they govern the Calp town hall, will they work to speed up the construction of the 2nd IES?
R. Exactly the same as the previous one. It is not possible, as has happened, to send an application in 2020, as the PP has done to have a fifth school, and in 3 years not know anything about it. Some for not answering, others for not insisting. This, being a priority, will have direct management, with specific compliance objectives and commitment dates that we will transfer to the public.. Look for reasonable alternatives and carry them out.
Apparently there was a public space to locate the new institute there. We do not know why the PP chose a private plot. The delay in the tender for the new institute is incomprehensible, it must be a priority and explain to the public the steps that are being followed. Transparency and responsibility is needed.
The fifth school likewise needs to streamline its management. These are priorities that will be at the starting point of our management. We have lost four years in which the PP has been focused on not-so-priority actions, such as the Manzanera social club, which ultimately has no solution. We have wasted too much time on issues that are far from the general interest and priorities for the residents of Calpe.
Q. TOURISM. Do you advocate continuing to defend sun and beach tourism in the summer season or do you propose promoting another type of tourism throughout the year?
R. The tourism sector must be ordered, set objectives, demonstrate that they are met and thus improve the quality of life of the residents of Calp. The tourist model followed in Calpe is a very specific one, that of the masses, which prioritizes the influx of tourists, but without knowing how much they leave in Calpe. More doesn't have to be better.
They use this model with the excuse that it is good that there are a lot of people in Calpe, but without any evidence to prove it. Thus, they achieve that the sole objective of developing tourist homes to meet that demand and that only benefits speculators, we see it as the only option. Not true, there are alternatives.
The reality is quite different. So much influx does not mean an improvement in the pockets of citizens, in their spending capacity, in their income. On the contrary, it generates a saturation of public services that the residents of Calp support. Nothing tells us that mass tourism is better. We must attend to what they leave and that will be the starting point of our tourism model in which we prioritize that demand that favors the interests of all. That demand that leaves more in small businesses, for example, which does not happen now and so we have spent years and years with the false hope that more tourists will give us more, but they consume less and those with more spending capacity do not return by the mass itself.
You cannot take small measures, occurrences, on one or another isolated tourist segment that does not fully improve our local economy. The sector must be resolved globally so that everyone, workers and businesses, obtain more. In short, ordering and intelligently planning tourism in a sustainable way.
Which is better, that 100 tourists who spend €100 a day come, or 50 tourists who spend €300 a day? The second option is clearly better, but the PP, historical accomplice of those who only look out for their speculative interest, wants 200 tourists, whatever they spend. It doesn't matter, because they will have already been sold a home and from there, they no longer care about the future impact on their own municipality, sufficiency of resources, overcrowding, increase in housing prices, precarious jobs, etc. They seek the short-term benefit of a few with the ability to influence the PP.
Q. TRANSPORTATION. Do you think Calp is a municipality with good urban public transport?
R. Public transport in Calpe has a difficult solution, due to the terrible urban planning. It is a regional competition, but there are alternatives that we will develop to facilitate mobility between the different areas of Calp. Such a dispersed town needs a plan according to its needs and this does not exist after so many years.
Q. INFRASTRUCTURES. What infrastructures do you consider are most necessary for Calp?
R. The priorities will be established by the residents of Calpe. There is too much to do. Mainly, they are, a priori, the sanitation of many homes, public spaces, such as parks, sports facilities, which are scarce and do not cover the needs of the users, especially the boys and girls of the sports schools. A city must have the infrastructures that the people require, a balance between housing and the necessary infrastructures, one thing should not be developed without the other.
Q. SOCIAL SERVICES. How do you think they should be improved? Calp Social Services?
R. We have a project to reorganize the entire town hall. In it, the priorities that the neighbors need and all the areas, including social services, will be established. They will begin to work proactively to solve existing needs, facilitating procedures, helping to fill out and formalize applications, simplifying the instances for requesting aid, assigning more staff than already exists if necessary to be close to people who need it.
Q. URBAN PLANNING. How should the urban future of Calp be? What measures in this matter do you propose?
R. Calpe is planned to accommodate, if everything that is projected is built, more than 90.000 inhabitants. This is outrageous, it is a very big risk that we are assuming. Resources, especially water, are not enough for this and we cannot bear such pressure.
The first thing to do is review the General Plan to reorganize the entire municipality with the aim of making a more humane city, made for the residents of Calpe, and not becoming a theme park where you only think about meeting the tourist demand forgetting the needs of the Calpinos and Calpinas.
In the same way, we will protect the environment, the landscape, the natural resources, with the tools that we have, forcing the presentation of landscape integration studies, effectively measuring the environmental impact of each new urban project. The beach, not only as a natural asset, but also as an indirect business asset, must be taken care of, reinforcing its integrity and maintenance, in order to find the much-needed balance between tourist influx and sustainability.. We cannot look at the short term, the long term should be everyone's goal because we all want Calp to survive bad politics. There is no Calp B, we only have one, and we are definitely losing it if we do not make deep, courageous changes, and with environmental, social and economic intelligence, it is not incompatible, no matter how much they have told us that it cannot be done.
The status quo resists these measures, because they want to materialize their speculative investments, where only four win and all the rest lose. We are independent, without ties, without interests behind. We must transform our municipality into something where we all take part in its development, through public consultations, reliable data and courageous decisions. Because everything that matters, for us, is in Calpe.
