CalpeNoticias EN

The footbaths on Calpe's Fossa beach are back in operation. The company in charge of the maintenance service of this infrastructure and which has recently been awarded the tender managed by the Generalitat Valenciana has carried out between Wednesday 24th and Thursday 25th July the repair works of the pumping system, which was broken since March and which prevented the footbaths of the beach from working.

However, the system will be in test mode for a few days.

The breakdown of this service has led to numerous complaints from users and the Town Council itself requested in a letter to Turisme Comunitat Valenciana its interest in taking over the responsibility for repairing them, something which was not possible and so it has not been possible to rectify these deficiencies until the service was awarded by the Generalitat.

Aguas de Calpe has installed a filtered and refrigerated drinking water fountain in the Plaza Constitución square in Calpe, right in the centre of the municipality. The aim is to promote the consumption of tap water and to reduce the use of plastics.

Citizens will be able to refill their personal water bottles free of charge, which are automatically refilled as this fountain is equipped with a sensor.

This initiative is part of the Climate Change Adaptation Plan carried out by Global Omnium for Calpe Town Council.

‘This is the same water that the residents of Calpe have at home, although in this case refrigerated, to better withstand the high summer temperatures; with this we want to promote the consumption of tap water, which is a high quality water, and raise awareness about the need to reduce the use of bottled water that has a great environmental impact,’ said the mayoress of Calp, Ana Sala.

Calpe is getting ready to enjoy the patron saint's fiestas, which will begin on 31 July, and for this reason the Town Hall has hosted a meeting to coordinate the security operation for the festivities. The meeting was attended by the Councillor for Public Safety, Guillermo Sendra, together with members of the Local Police, the Department of Festivities, led by Mariola Mulet, the Department of Equality, the 2024 Festivities Commission and two representatives of the group of clubs.

During the meeting, various aspects were discussed to ensure that the fiestas run safely for residents and visitors. Thus, the regulation of noise schedules has been addressed and it has been agreed to establish a regulation of the schedules of noisy activities to minimise the inconvenience to residents. This measure seeks to balance the enjoyment of the fiestas with the residents' rest, establishing specific time slots for concerts, open-air dances and other noisy activities.

This year, for the first time, regulations have been established for the operation of the peñas or casales during the fiestas, which must be registered with the OAC and must keep to a timetable both inside and outside the premises depending on the days of the fiestas, adapting to the official programme of the fiestas. The aim is to keep noise emissions within limits that do not exceed the limits of the ordinance and do not generate conflicts with neighbours.

Safety during the fiestas has also been given absolute priority. To this end, a comprehensive plan has been designed which includes the reinforced presence of the Local Police and collaboration with other security forces. In addition, strategic control points will be set up in the busiest areas to prevent and act quickly in the event of any incident.

On the other hand, the City Council, in its commitment to equality and the fight against gender violence, will set up Violet Points in the Plaza Mayor to prevent and, if necessary, act in the event of possible cases of male violence during the patron saint festivities. These points will be set up in the Plaza Mayor on 30 July and 1,2,3,4,5 August from 23:30 to 03:30. It will be a visible space staffed by qualified personnel and coordinated with the different professional agents involved. Its aim is to promote respect for women so that they can enjoy the fiestas without violence or the risk of sexist aggression of any kind or intensity.

Calpe town council is planning to seal the old municipal landfill site in the town. This is intended to solve the historical environmental problem of waste disposal that has existed at this site since the closure of the facilities in the 1990s. The landfill, located in the Mascarat Gorge, was closed at the time without the appropriate waste treatment being carried out.

Among the various options for solving the problem, the city council decided in favour of sealing the landfill, i.e. sealing the surface of the site to prevent leachate from entering the ravine and the groundwater. In this way, other options were ruled out, such as sending the waste to the Campello treatment plant due to the high environmental cost of transporting it, as thousands of tonnes of waste accumulate in these facilities.

The City Council has invited tenders for the preparation of the technical project, which will determine the depth of the existing accumulation and the measures to be taken to seal the surface of this land.

‘We started to deal with this problem in the last legislature and we have been able to organise the tender for the development of the project to seal this landfill, the best solution we have for this environmental problem’, said the Councillor for Municipal Solid Waste, Juan Manuel del Pino.

The tender for the development of the project, which has a basic budget of 60,000 euros and an estimated execution period of six months, is currently in the phase of evaluating the bids submitted.

Calpe Town Council has announced the grants for the promotion of sport 2023-2024, for which an amount of 235,000 euros has been earmarked, with rules that aim to promote, among other aspects, sports associations.

This aid, aimed at local sports organisations, has two lines: line 1 with aid for participation in official sports competitions and the promotion of local grassroots sport, and line 2 with aid for the organisation of sporting events.

One of the objectives of these bases is to promote the associationism and therefore to obtain 100% of a grant of more than 12,000 euros, the sports entity will be required to prove that it has a minimum of 100 members, otherwise the grant will be reduced to 75%. For grants of up to 12,000 euros, a minimum of 50 members will be required; if this figure is lower, the grant will be 75%.

Other assessment criteria are the number of sportspeople with an official federation licence or participants in the Jocs Esportius de la Comunidad Valenciana, the number of categories of the club, the type of competition or the qualifications of the coaches and medical-health staff, as well as the ownership of the sports facilities.

On the other hand, eligible expenses will include travel expenses for attending national competitions or those derived from the competition itself, such as refereeing, sports equipment, monitors' expenses, etc. All expenses derived from the organisation of the sporting event that is the object of the subsidy will also be considered eligible expenses. The promotion of local sports will also be considered.

The grants are aimed at sports organisations with registered offices in Calpe, which will be able to submit their applications from tomorrow 24th July until 7th August via the electronic office.

The Tourism Department of Calpe Town Council has launched a survey on business confidence in the municipality in order to find out the perception of businessmen on the evolution of the economic situation of the municipality. This initiative is one of the requirements of the Calpe Strategic Tourism Plan and the Smart Tourism Destination Master Plan.

The Business Confidence Indicators are an interim survey whose aim is to gather the opinions of company managers on the current situation, as well as the company's prospects for the future. The target population are the establishments with at least one worker, distributed throughout the municipality of Calpe and the survey will be carried out quarterly

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In the survey, aimed at a minimum of 200 companies, Calpe's entrepreneurs are asked to evaluate the turnover, employment, investment and price index of the last quarter, as well as their expectations for the following quarter. They are also asked about the factors limiting the activity of the business in question.

These surveys will make it possible in the long term to know how business confidence is evolving, to monitor business confidence by quarter and to compare it with the national and regional data.

The Tourism Department ohas sent a letter to businesses registered in the Commerce and Tourism databases announcing the initiative and asking for their collaboration. The survey is voluntary, and the Town Council is very positive about its implementation, which in the first series has already received more than 200 responses.

As every summer, the Town Hall reminds beach users of the Municipal Ordinance for the Use and Management of the Coastline which prohibits the installation of chairs, sunbeds or sunshades before 9:30 a.m. so as not to hinder the cleaning of the beaches.

This measure prohibits the indiscriminate occupation of the public domain and makes special reference to the occupation of the beach with elements such as chairs, deckchairs and parasols from the early hours of the day.

This trend makes it difficult to clean the beaches, so the ordinance establishes that all items installed on the beaches before 9:30 a.m. may be removed and the owners denounced.

The ordinance also states that umbrellas, chairs or deckchairs left for more than three hours without the presence of their owners throughout the day may be removed. If there is evidence of these elements being installed without the presence of a responsible person or owner, the Town Council, through the Local Police and its cleaning staff, may remove these elements from the beach and transfer them to the Municipal Depot.

For some years now, the Town Council has received numerous complaints during the summer about the reservation of space on the beach, as when users arrive at the beach mid-morning they find metres of beach occupied without the owners of the elements installed being present.

The removal by the owners of the items deposited at the Local Police checkpoint will be carried out in accordance with the provisions of the tax ordinance regulating the police, good governance and taxation of non-sedentary sales.

Today we have welcomed the staff hired under the Local Employment Plan 2024. In this edition there are 47 workers hired through this plan that will run until the end of the year and has an investment of 1,000,000 euros. The main objective of the Employment Plan is to promote employability among groups with special difficulties for social and labour insertion.

The provision of these positions has been carried out by competition and the duration of the contracts is until the end of the year. A total of 47 posts have been offered with the following professional categories: 3 posts of caretaker in the Casa de Cultura, 6 posts of caretaker in Sports, 1 caretaker in schools, 6 posts of cleaning staff, 8 posts of labourer, 2 posts of animal collection service operator, 15 posts of environmental watchman, 5 posts of administrative assistant and 1 post of administrative assistant in the library.

To take part in this competition, the applicants had to be registered in the public employment service with a minimum of 3 months of uninterrupted seniority, be registered in Calpe and be at least 16 years old.

Given that the Employment Plan is a social measure of job creation, which tries especially to promote the employability of those groups with special difficulties for social and labour insertion, in the bases of the Plan prevail social criteria such as being a beneficiary of Social Services aid, being a large family, being a job seeker, etc... The Plan is endowed with €1,000,000 and will involve the temporary hiring of these staff until 31 December.

The Councillor for Human Resources, Paqui Solivelles, stressed the importance of this plan: "This initiative not only responds to the need to strengthen municipal services, but is also a firm commitment to support those who need it most. With this investment of one million euros, we are not only expanding our staff, but also contributing to the socio-economic development of Calpe. We are committed to employment policies that allow us to cover situations of vulnerability".