Podemos survey confirms biggest concern of residents is mass construction

Wednesday 16th March 2022 – Mike Smith
Source: original article – Carlos López (Xàbia AL DÍA)

Podemos Xàbia has released the results of a survey of residents in the town which it carried out to gauge public opinion on municipal day-to-day issues, a questionnaire presented in three languages which was completed by 236 people.

Spokesperson Bernhard Feiner explained that the main concern of those surveyed is the mass construction across the town as it experiences a real boom in the sector, with cranes observed at all points across the the municipality. Almost 80% of all those surveyed considered it as their prime concern, whilst 100% of those who responded to the Valencian language version marked mass construction as the main problem in the town.

Other aspects of concern were the sea and the coast (70%), rubbish and recycling (60%) and the danger of fires (50%).

The survey also addressed other issues and when asked if there were enough qualified jobs in Xàbia, almost half of the respondents considered that there was little employment of this nature whilst an average of just 15% believed that there was enough. What is curious is that just over 38% of those who responded to the English version of the survey considered that there were not enough qualified jobs in Xàboa.

Unsurprisingly, 78% of those surveyed felt that there was a need to improve public transport in the town, whilst the same response was met to improve public parks and gardens.

The question of leisure options for different age groups was raised in the survey and, according to the results, the majority of those responded said that there was not enough, especially those in the 13 to 17 years group and those who responded to the Valencian version, some 80%.

Some 73% of those who responded said that help for the elderly and dependents must be improved whilst 64% supported the implementation of scholarships and free extracurricular activities, whilst 59% supported better care for the homeless. In addition, the respondents rates the cleanliness of streets, squares and parks as “poor to fair” with percentages ranging from 67% to 90%.

In response to the survey, Podemos spokesperson Bernhard Feiner said that all the suggestions that the participants put on the table are “sensible” and that the party intends to incorporate them into their manifesto for next year’s local elections.

Specifically, he said that some residents in the urbanizations have told them that both the streets and pavements are “terrible” and he suggested that instead of lowering the rate of IBI – property tax – the money could have been invested in improving them.

Full details of the survey results can be found in this link.

It should be noted that the current registered population of Xàbia is 27,983 (Source: INE), thus the respondents represent less than 1% of that total.