The Municipal Budget of Faro was rejected yesterday by the Municipal Assembly, thanks to two votes against by members of the PSD, the party that leads the coalition in power in the Municipal Council.
The budget proposal of the executive led by Rogério Bacalhau was rejected with 15 votes against, 13 of which were from opposition parties, namely the PS (9), the CDU (2, one of the municipal deputies was not present), the PAN (1 ) and the Bloco de Esquerda (1), but also Gameiro Alves and Tiago Botelho, two municipal deputies from the PSD, elected by the coalition “Unidos Por Faro”, which brings together PSD, CDS, MPT, PPM and Liberal Initiative.
Therefore, the remaining 13 votes from the coalition bench, 11 from directly elected members and the two presidents of the PSD Board, were not enough to pass the document. In the AM session that took place in the Paços do Concelho de Faro, this Wednesday night, there were still two abstentions, one from the elected by Chega! and another from the president of the Union of Parishes of Conceição and Estoi, elected by the PS.
Contacted by Sul Informação, Tiago Botelho, one of the PSD members who voted against the Municipal Budget for 2024, referred to the joint vote statement that he read during yesterday's Municipal Assembly, to which our newspaper had access.
In it, the two social democrats justify the proposal's lead with concerns about some of the executive's options, namely the absence of measures in the budget that they consider fundamental, such as reducing the tariff charged by FAGAR and issues linked to housing, among others. .
This is because, they say, «the current municipal mandate [is] at a crucial point of scrutiny by voters», since the next municipal elections, to take place in 2025, are increasingly on the horizon.
In this way, «it is considered desirable to highlight some investment and current expenditure options that can be followed by the municipal executive, seeking to obtain a higher than historical execution rate for the 2024 municipal budget and that this reverts in favor of the citizens ».
One of the recommendations is that the executive comply with the «several recommendations approved by the Municipal Assembly, relating to the FAGAR tariff, which could involve the full assumption of urban cleaning expenses by the Chamber, withdrawing this amount, in its entirety, directly of the water bill and also undergo a general lowering of the tariff».
In their declaration of vote, the two PSD municipal deputies also talk about “accelerating public housing policy to eradicate the phenomena of sub-housing, as the Horta da Areia neighborhood is always a negative example”.
Other measures that Tiago Botelho and Gameiro Alves consider necessary for the Municipal Budget for 2024 to deserve approval is the creation of more playgrounds and green areas, «like the possible third green lung of the city next to RTP», a reinforcement of the machinery and contracts «to intervene in public space, namely in its hygiene, cleaning and conservation», investment «in the rainwater drainage of urban areas and in particular in Rua de São Luís in Faro» and the «reinforcement of the skills and financial resources of the Parish Councils».
The PAN, whose vote helped to reject the proposal of the executive led by Rogério Bacalhau, has also gone public to justify its option.
Paulo Baptista, the municipal deputy for People-Animals-Nature in Faro, pointed out, in a press release, «the lack of strategic environmental vision for the municipality, crystallized in the stubbornness of building the future recreational port in a sensitive area of the Ria Formosa Natural Park, which will cause irreparable damage».
«This is an insurmountable red line for the PAN in Faro. If a marina is to be built, it should be built where the negative environmental impacts are minimal or non-existent and the gains for the municipality are evident, helping to recover one of the most degraded areas of the city, providing citizens with the privilege of being able to enjoy proximity to the Ria Formosa. The new recreational port to take place should move to the current Commercial Port, an option defended by scientists and researchers from the University of Algarve», stated the PAN member at the Municipal Assembly of Faro.
At issue are impacts such as “the destruction of the seagrass meadow and elimination of the nursery function of that area with capacity for 5000 babies of various species per square meter, including seahorses, by sending more than 600 tons of CO2 into the atmosphere, the equivalent of the impact of 200 hectares of forest burning and at the same time the loss of the carbon sink function and the capacity to retain almost 40 tons of CO2 per year, in addition to other negative impacts across the ecosystem, which functions as a whole ».
In addition to environmental issues, Paulo Baptista also points out «the excessive pressure placed on families on water bills after changing the tariff, without this resulting in an improvement in FAGAR's service».
«When it comes to waste management, the municipal company FAGAR is doing a mediocre job. Faro It's a dirty city, with overflowing containers, rubbish on the sidewalks, poop on the side of the road. Public space, such as Passeio Ribeirinho, is in a deplorable state,” he pointed out.
The PS, the main opposition party in Faro, also went public to talk about the budget's lead with votes against by those elected by the PSD, «to everyone's surprise».
For the socialists, the budget's lead «is demonstrative and revealing that the PSD's political cycle is ahead of the destiny of the Municipality of Faro is exhausted and has come to an end – especially because it is not the responsibility of the Socialist Party, which did not win elections in Faro, get the budget approved».
«We have no doubt: this was a bad budget for the municipality – as the PSD itself confirmed», he said.
The Socialist Party states that it is “available to facilitate a new Municipal Budget proposal for 2024 that supports families, that translates into an investment in education policies, that invests in the requalification and maintenance of the municipal housing stock, that invests homogeneously in all parishes in the municipality of Faro, which makes social action a true pillar of social and territorial cohesion».
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