The City Council and Neighborhood Council present the Participatory Budget for 2021

Once the Participatory Budget, presented by the Neighborhood Council on February 23, has been evaluated by the Municipal Technical Services, today the actions that will be carried out in Benidorm this year have been announced, after the analysis of all the proposals made by the neighborhood associations and citizens.

The mayor of Benidorm, Toni Pérez, and the councilors for Citizen Participation and Public Space, Ana Pellicer and José Ramón González de Zárate, have held a working meeting with the vice presidents of the Neighborhood Council, Teresa Garrido and Manuel Sánchez Notario. Subsequently, Toni Pérez has transferred the feasibility reports that allow their execution to the different political groups that make up the corporation, incorporating them on the agenda of the next informative commissions.

Toni Pérez thanked the residents for their involvement "to improve the city much more with their proposals" and recalled that the Participatory Budget starts with "at least 5% of the Municipal Budget, which amounts to around 600,000 euros."

In the feasibility report, the municipal technicians have studied each of the 67 proposals submitted to this year's Participatory Budget, actions that, as a whole, far exceed the amount allocated to it.

Among the initiatives, one that has been highlighted very positively in the technical feasibility report, refers to the roundabout of Ricardo Bayona with Venezuela Avenue. "The confluence - the mayor has qualified - of the residential area, CEIP Ausiàs March, Foietes health center, the specialty center and Miguel Hernández school in its upper part with the traffic entrances to Benidorm from Poniente" .

It is an urban enclave in which traffic generates "quite a lot of tension" at some times of the day, "especially coinciding with the entrances and exits of schools." The neighborhood proposal is committed to "winning calmly and improving the flow of traffic."

Based on this initiative, the municipal technicians have carried out the project and the assessment of what would be the complete action, from the elliptical roundabout of Ricardo Bayona that leads to Jaime I, to Nicaragua Avenue that gives access to Miguel Hernández. "The global intervention - Toni Pérez has specified - would be around 900,000 euros, with which we would far exceed what is the Participatory Budget, but we are going to see how we can fit the project to carry it out."

The plan proposes the total renovation of the area "with the creation of new signalized pedestrian crossings and the self-regulation of traffic according to intensity." Likewise, it is committed to the renovation and expansion of the sidewalks and pedestrian areas, the creation of a cycle lane in the direction of Vía Parque and with the conversion of the direction of descent towards Jaime I into a cycle track.

Many of the proposals of the neighbors, although they cannot be incorporated into the Participatory Budget, will end up being carried out by the City Council, those that request the planting of trees, or affect accessibility projects “because the City Council is going to execute them yes or Yes". "This government team - the mayor has underlined - is very clear that the city has to be accessible and every hole in which a tree can be planted will be planted."

Toni Pérez has given an example of the Participatory Budget for 2020, whose fund “was donated by the Neighborhood Council to serve families affected by Covid-19. And we must thank him ”. However, many of his proposals have been carried out directly by the City Council "such as the actions in Juan Antonio Baldoví, Calpe street or Plaza de las Tiendas". Pérez has anticipated that "surely" the 600,000 euros that will be managed through the Neighborhood Council will end up "doubling or tripling" as a good part of these ideas are incorporated into the Municipal Budget.