With the resignation of Albert Piñeira to be the head of the Junts list in Puigcerdà , after three terms as mayor with a loose absolute majority, the scene that opens in the capital of Cerdanya on 28- M much tighter. Six candidacies are presented to lead the Pyrenees municipality, where Junts currently governs with nine of the thirteen councillors, three from ERC and one from the PP. Half of the lists presented are from the post-convergent orbit.
Piñeira’s successor, elected in some primaries by a narrow margin, is the traumatologist Jordi Gassió, who presents himself with a non-continuist candidacy. Only two councilors repeat from the last electoral call. Gassió, who, among other positions, has held that of general director of the Fire Department, was the head of the CiU list between 2007 and 2011, a term in which Piñeira made his debut as a councilor, who is now stepping aside, adding that he needs a time of “rest and decompression”.
The one who finished second in the Junts primaries, Carme MartÃ, has decided to create her own party, Treballem por Puigcerdà . And businessman Francesc Armengol, former member of the CDC, is also running for mayor with the municipalist candidate Futur for Puigcerdà .
In ERC, Joan Manel Serra repeats, who aspires to recover for the Republicans a mayoralty that they obtained between 1991 and 2011. The candidacies are completed by the PP, which aspires to keep its only councilor, and the PSC, which hopes to return to enter the plenary, without representation since 2011
One of the main points of debate of the campaign will be the lack of housing, a problem that is not exclusive to the municipality but to the whole of Cerdanya. The high price (it is the second region after Barcelonès where the square meter is more expensive), the pressure of second residences, the proliferation of homes for tourist use and the shortage of officially protected flats is a cocktail that is expelling many young people and also families to other areas with less tourist pressure, such as Berguedà or the south of France.
Whoever governs will have to unblock a promotion of around 140 officially protected homes in the Pedregosa sector, promoted during this mandate, but which has been slowed down by the denunciation of opposing economic sectors. “It is the main objective, the promotion would give some air to the shortage of affordable housing”, says Gassio. He recognizes the added problem that owners are more likely to rent their homes for the season to get more income and also the difficulties of people who work in Puigcerdà to find a home that is within their means.
It puts on the table options such as the farmhouse, making it easier for apartment owners to rehabilitate the properties so that they can make them available to a municipality that during the pandemic reached almost 10,000 inhabitants. Serra is committed to creating a university cycle linked to medicine, taking advantage of the strength of the cross-border hospital.
A municipality that has in its roadmap to urge the administrations to solve chronic deficits in infrastructure such as the forgotten R-3 train line. Improvements to shorten travel time and the reliability of a journey that approaches three hours. Investments that, according to the main leaders of the list, must come regardless of whether the region is the scene of an Olympic Games in the future.
The outgoing mayor considers that “an opportunity has been lost” but urges “not to abandon the project”, which would have meant an investment in the improvement of R-3 and in housing issues with the creation of an Olympic village, according to Piñeira. His successor in the candidacy, Jordi Gassio, is tiptoeing over the issue at the moment. “We can’t take sides or go for or against, first you need to know what the project is about”, he explains. ERC considers that the project should not be put on hold, although before entering the “debate of whether games yes or games no” the “deficiencies” of the region must be resolved.
