The mayor of Figueira da Foz, Pedro Santana Lopes, predicted this Thursday a “very difficult” economic year for 2023 due to the constant increase in priceswhich will have a strong impact on the municipal budget.
“Requests for price revisions arrive on my desk every day. [de empreitadas] from 20 to 30 percent, almost all 30 percent”, emphasized the mayor elected by the Figueira a Primeira movement, at the meeting of the Municipal Assembly this Thursday afternoon.
Santana Lopes also mentioned the “scandalous” increase of four times the base rate of the cost of the urban solid waste treatment rate to be paid to the Empresa de Residuos Sólidos Urbanos do Centro (ERSUC), whose base shareholder is private.
For the mayor, this situation is a “scandal decided by the regulatory authority, which made an incredible decision”regretting that a meeting has not yet been held with the Minister of the Environment to discuss the issue, after all the municipalities that make up the Intermunicipal Community of the Coimbra Region have decided that they do not pay the update of that rate.
The increase in raw material costs for the supply of goods and services is extremely heavy and, therefore, this budget that we will have to face next year will be extremely difficult”, he emphasized.
In the session, and after being confronted with the reinforcement of the municipal allocation for the Christmas and New Year’s Eve parties, with an endowment close to half a million euros, the mayor of Figueira da Foz clarified that the amount was due to “a sum of parcels”.
“It was silly that this budget change was left with 500 thousand euros. It is evident that, in a year like this, we cannot and will not spend this amount, or anything similar,” said Santana Lopes.
According to the mayor, the municipality “will spend less than in any of the last years that can be compared.”
When addressing the municipal deputies, Santana Lopes was willing not to invest in Christmas lighting, or in the New Year’s party, if the opposition understands it, which is the majority in the Chamber and Municipal Assembly.
The leader of the PS bench in the Municipal Assembly, João Portugal, was available for a pact that leads to the approval of the next municipal budget, since he has the majority of the municipal deputies.
Source: Observadora
