While the city tries to recover from this week’s electoral shocks, there are constants on the street that do not change: the dirt and the palpable remains of a chronic incivility, which increases when the real population of Barcelona does as well, as a result of low-level tourism. As is mandatory, the new municipal administration must be granted the regulatory grace period for the start-up of its management. In any case, there are hopeful steps taken by Mayor Collboni regarding the position that the Consistory will adopt against incivility. The council wants to toughen certain aspects of the civility ordinance that was launched in 2006 – and which is now called the coexistence ordinance – so that the landscape on public roads is not so bleak.
As you may already know, a few weeks ago Jaume Collboni visited the premises of the Urban Guard and the cleaning services, quite a declaration of intent for someone who promised to have a cleaner and safer city. And the mayor would do well to take the issue seriously and make it a non-negotiable element, even if in the future he needs to agree again with political forces that are not so supportive of order in the public space. There are several problems that, together, generate that despicable aspect of the streets with containers full of garbage, pavements that need a lift rather than cleaning, remains of urine and other excellences.
On the one hand, the City Council will have to ensure that the fulfillment of the expensive cleaning contract is real and efficient. And, on the other hand, it will be necessary to put the rattle on the cat to control more uncivil behavior and punish them with the necessary firmness, not as is currently the case. To give an example, if urinating in the street or leaving rubbish without control is observed by an officer (difficult) and he issues a fine, getting the payment of this infraction is a more difficult mission to achieve than seeing Carles Puigdemont shouting long live Spain.
It is necessary to ensure that there are more fines and that they are compulsory. To nationals and foreigners. It will be necessary to devise a system so that the offender does not get away with it, because not stopping this type of behavior only turns the excess into a habit, and therefore, into the extension of a form of behavior that makes the city ugly and makes it unbearable for those of us who pay taxes there.
Collboni will have to activate the machinery and obtain complicity with other administrations. The Generalitat will have to commit to expanding its police force in Barcelona and it will be necessary to recover supra-municipal control systems (Area Metropolitana, Diputació de Barcelona) so that the pressure of decorum works.
