The Malaga City Council does not want squatters: operation to close shacks underway

They began to make strange noises, like nails scraping a piece of wood, then what could be small knocks on a door, and ... finally, they gave themselves away. These are things of nature, that cannot be restrained. In fact, they haven't stopped, and when the chicks began to chirp in the nest, in the municipal groups of the Málaga City Council, where political parties are housed, they knew something was up. Well, more precisely, a bird was trapped, and not just one; there were quite a few.

There, inside the wonderful iroko wood booths, which the Operational Services area changed in 2021, next to the windows to ensure the building was watertight, and rainwater did not enter the rooms, the miracle of life occurs every spring. And the occupation, which this time seemed allowed and consented.

It seems that the old pine wood drawers of the century-old building were not to their liking, and for a couple of years, they have decided to return every spring to the apartment overlooking the gardens of Pedro Luis Alonso or Puerta Oscura: do not think that swifts make their home just anywhere.

The official tenants of the parties, well those gentlemen and ladies who come and go as the citizens elect them in the polls, some councilors, and other advisors and technicians, thought they were dealing with what is known as planes, but the way they make the nest, among other characteristics, but the Spanish Ornithological Society (SEO-Bird Life) determined what creatures they were, as the experts speak in their jargon. And since the birds are exquisite and selective, they were identified as 'Apus apus' or 'Apus pallidus' (common and pale swifts), which are migratory and come to breed from Africa, where the heat affects them, hence they appear here every spring.

The swifts came to the wooden booths to breed and they stayed there for a couple of months, making noises, and you could hear the chicks and such, but they also emitted odors, droppings fell when the blinds were opened and closed, and even some of them decided, well, they died there. This has occasionally caused nauseating odors and dirtiness in the offices on the second floor until the Operational Services area decided to put an end to the swifts' mating visits, and in an anti-squatting operation with beak and wings, they arranged for two technicians from the area, Javier Oterino and Javier Soto, with a sizable crane, to go up to the second and last floor facing the street. The arm brings them close to the booths, where they place a cover they made specifically for the size of the holes and seal them with cover strips.

Beforehand, they performed a thorough cleaning of all those booths, which were in a lamentable state for their short lifespan and for being made of iroko wood. It is worth remembering that the Casona del Parque is a Property of Cultural Interest (BIC) and that all its elements must be preserved, although recently the roof of the third floor fell in, right in the offices of the unions, and currently it does not pass the Building Technical Inspection (ITE), as this newspaper already reported.

Swifts are an unusual species because they do not perch anywhere and have very short legs. They sleep while flying, and even mate while flying, so when they entered the booth, it was to collapse half dead from so much activity. With this hustle, it is almost impossible to catch them in flight, although it is noticeable that they move with frantic flapping and all out of control, as if they were going to crash. As they are insectivores, they cleaned the area of mosquitoes and kept these annoying insects at bay, since these birds need hundreds of them a day to live.

They could be observed every spring in the gardens of Pedro Luis Alonso and Puerta Oscura and we hope they continue to find spaces around there so that we can continue to enjoy their spectacular races in the air.

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Complaints from the left. Toni Morillas complains about the 'Ayuso model' of housing

The left-wing opposition in the Málaga City Council has positioned itself against the selection process for the VPO of Lagoon Living in the University sector (parcel R3). The socialist spokesperson, Dani Pérez, last Friday criticized the City Council for excluding these 62 VPOs to precarious workers while facilitating their entry to high incomes, stating that "they close the door to those earning just over the minimum wage, with incomes below 25,000 euros, while giving facilities to incomes up to 71,000 euros".

Later, the criticisms came from the spokesperson for Con Málaga, Nico Sguiglia (Podemos), who accused Mayor Paco de la Torre of "distorting" protected housing with VPO for high salaries, which he described as another "failure of the PP's housing policy".

This Monday, it was the turn of the vice-spokesperson for Con Málaga, Toni Morillas (IU), who did not hesitate to accuse De la Torre of implementing the "Ayuso model" which excludes low and middle incomes from protected housing. The IU leader denounces that the PP government team is promoting protected housing with "classist and elitist" criteria, demanding incomes over 2,100 euros per month to access new developments promoted along with the investment fund Lagoon Living. Morillas states that "this model leaves out the majority of working families and those in urgent need of housing, despite there being 65 families in urgent need of housing."