The Department of Personnel will shortly activate the process to have another 55 troops that will allow strengthening services and new bases
The Local Police will be rearmed during this 2022 with human resources and bases, to reach next year with an operation never seen in the last decade. The main novelty will be the consolidation of neighborhood agents. It is a service that was announced in 2020 and entered service in 2021, as a pilot program. Its next implantation areas will be Los Dolores and the Estación Sector, where citizen complaints about the lack of security have intensified in recent months.
Since the end of last summer, couples of motorcyclists have been busy patrolling the Ensanche, the Virgen de la Caridad neighborhood, Torreciega, the Peral neighborhood, José María Lapuerta, San Félix and Cuatro Santos. The objective pursued is that the neighbors feel supported in their daily routine in the face of any potential threat.
Citizen demands for more security collided with police retirements during the previous stage of the Popular Party at the head of the City Council. The first call to contract more in ten years was completed in 2017, with a coalition government between the MC and PSOE. But the incorporation of 47 new troops took place in 2019, again with the PP in power.
The device already works in San Félix, the Ensanche, Torreciega Virgen de la Caridad, Barrio Peral and Cuatro Santos
In a few weeks the bases will be published to carry out the selection tests of 55 more troops during the current exercise. The goal is to have them operational at the beginning of 2023, although they are still being tested during their training at the City Council’s School of Public Safety (ESPAC).
reduce vacancies
The commitment of the executive led by Noelia Arroyo, from the PP, and has Juan Pedro Torralba as Councilor for Security, goes beyond counteracting the casualties due to retirement that have decimated the workforce and led to a deficit of close to one hundred agents on the 360 seats body totals, five years ago. This lack of troops damaged street brigades, such as the environment and markets, and led to an increasing aging of the workforce. In addition, it meant a progressive overload of extraordinary services, covered with the hours of the special dedication regime (RED). The extra cost to pay for them weighs down the cost of the City Council’s staff for years. This year, 4.4 million, has generated a wake-up call from the municipal comptroller in his report on the municipal budget. With the addition of new agents, this pressure will also be reduced, which the unions say they are not satisfied with either.
The deployment in Los Dolores is a need that has not been fully satisfied for a long time. In 2011, an attempt was made to create a barracks in the Castillito building, which had to be closed because it did not comply with occupational health and safety regulations as a police base. Likewise, in the Estación Sector there has been a recent wave of robberies and raids on buildings that has led residents to demand greater police coverage. Both neighborhoods will benefit from the signing of agents.
Having new base troops has already made it possible to also redouble the scale of intermediate managers, which was greatly reduced. At the end of last year, the inauguration of 18 new deputy inspectors took place, replacing the former corporals who had retired in recent years. These are the controls that have been missing for a long time, to command different units. The Environment, in particular, has become decisive with the modifications introduced in the cleaning ordinance, especially on graffiti, and to strictly enforce the one that regulates noise pollution.
Confidence in the head of the Corps
The frustrated call to have a chief commissioner of the Local Police, in which none of the eleven candidates passed the psychological tests, has led the government team to delay that process without a date. Pedro Moreno, current interim chief commissioner, “has all our trust and is doing an excellent job in these complicated times of restrictions due to the pandemic,” said Juan Pedro Torralba. For this reason, Moreno will continue to lead the Local Police. The rerun of the tests to have a permanent boss has been postponed.
“We will have the Pozo Estrecho and Cuesta Blanca barracks before the end of the year”
The implementation of the special service of the Local Police in more and more neighborhoods annexed to the urban center, to satisfy the neighbours’ demands, will be complemented in the provincial councils far from the center with the renovation of a barracks and the creation of another, at the end of this same year. The one in Pozo Estrecho, whose work has already begun, will allow the transfer of between ten and twelve agents to better-equipped premises. The building is already under construction, next to the local Music School. There is also one projected in Cuesta Blanca, which will serve as a base to improve the response capacity in the event of any emergency in the western area.
“We will have both bases equipped and ready before the end of this year,” said Councilor for Security, Juan Pedro Torralba. The works in the Galilee town have a budget of 340,000 euros. The barracks is scheduled to enter service later this year. It will replace the one that operated in a very old place in another point of the town.
With regard to Cuesta Blanca, in the middle of last year Torralba already gave reasons for choosing the main building of an old service station located in the center of town, opposite the doctor’s office. The gas station moved to the entrance and left its old facilities free. “They have all the security measures that we may need and adapting them will be very simple. With a contract of less than 60,000 euros it will be enough to achieve it, “he assured. That means just a few months of work, to have a complaints office and the basis for one or two fixed units, he added.
In addition, the mobile fleet of the Local Police will have four new patrol cars in a matter of days, to reach 22 fully operational. The imminent incorporation of motorcycles is also planned, to increase the mobility of the agents and facilitate the deployment of the neighborhood police.
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