Fans in a school classroom in Barcelona.Carles Ribas
Most of the town halls of the big Catalan cities have chosen not to take the gauntlet from the Ministry of Education, leaving them responsible for installing air conditioning in schools. They argue that the regulations on the subject are clear: “The city council only has the authority to run schools; “The investment corresponds to the Generalitat”, they say from Mataró, but it is an argument repeated by the great consistory consisted. In fact, of the ten most populous cities, only Barcelona and L’Hospitalet will benefit from the educational proposal, along with fifty other small and medium-sized municipalities.
The last part of the last school year and the beginning of the current year were marked by several heat waves, which caused classroom thermometers to generally rise to over 30 degrees. Beyond fans, families and teachers have long been calling for long-term solutions to the global warming problem. In May, the Ministry of Education unveiled the expected Quick Plan to Cope with High Temperatures in Schools, which would see the installation of air conditioning, albeit on a limited scale: only in one or two common spaces, such as libraries or gymnasiums, and only in a hundred institutes. About five million will be invested this year, with the air conditioning to be ready in September, but Education hopes to reach the remaining 800 institutes in about five years. However, the ministry refrains from interfering with the schools because the buildings are owned by the municipality.
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Education assured that it has spoken to city councilors to give them permission to carry out this installation and that so far fifty (out of 947 in total) have pledged to do so. Among them is the Catana capital. In this case, the institution is managed by the Barcelona Education Consortium, managed jointly by the Generalitat and the City Council. The company has created an environmental comfort program in educational centers that includes, among other things, the installation of air conditioning in 25 centers, 17 of which are schools (the cost of which is borne by the City Council) and 8 institutes (which are borne by the Generalitat).
L’Hospitalet de Llobregat – the city with the second largest population – also decided to take action on the matter after seeing the Education Ministry’s decision, authorizing a game of 2.5 million in April’s plenary session to go into the to install air conditioning in the dining rooms and common areas of its 36 children’s and elementary schools. However, it is clear to the city council that this would correspond to education. “The powers clearly lie with the ministry. The air conditioning is an improvement measure. An example of this is that to act we need the approval of the Generalitat,” they argue from the consistory.
He defends the same thing in Sitges, where in the medium term it is planned to have air conditioning in the schools – first he has to renew the electrical installations in the old buildings – but in a newly built building he has already installed air conditioning in all the rooms, although it is yet to be put into operation must. “It is an operation that costs 20,000 euros. We asked the ministry to pay for it, but they turned us down,” explains David Martínez, Sitges Councilor for Education. The City Council admits that this is not its responsibility, but ensures that it has invested 500,000 euros in improvement works over the past three years, which would be in accordance with the Generalitat. “If we don’t take care of it, they will [Educación] They don’t care. We feel it is our duty to do so,” concludes Martínez.
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This newspaper has asked the dozens of major communes and provincial capitals for their opinion on the Generalitat’s proposal. Apart from those who will do the installation and those who prefer not to answer – Badalona and Lleida – the rest reject them because they think they are not competent. Although many are in a transitional phase due to possible changes in government, city councils are resorting to the regulations, in particular Article 164 of the Catalan Education Law, which stipulates that “the ministry is responsible for the works and actions”. Reforms, expands or adapts and improves these educational centers and finances them.” “We think that is the case [instalación de aire acondicionado] It is a great work of the centers that must be fully taken over by the Generalitat. This intervention cannot be considered as maintenance, so the City Council is not ready to take it in hand,” they judge from Santa Coloma de Gramanet, arguing that governments of different colors are collapsing, not just socialists, as is the case in this case the case is .
Terrassa and Reus – whose education portfolio goes to ERC – also decline to work in schools. The Vallesan co-capital assures that its plans are focused on kindergartens, special education centers and community music schools. “The municipal competence is maintenance and something that does not exist cannot be maintained,” they explain from the Egarense City Council, which also considers the systematic installation of air conditioning unsustainable and advocates measures with a lower environmental impact.
In the same line of priorities, Tarragona expresses itself, which, in addition to the lack of powers and the untenable solution of the air, claims that the City Council has “no economic capacity” because, apart from the establishment in the thirty public schools, it has “no economic capacity” would have had to pay the electricity bill. “Each measure must be in reasonable proportion to the economic possibilities of the community, a small community is not the same as a large one,” emphasizes the consistory.
“We ask the Generalitat to exercise its powers and air-condition the schools, instead of doing the usual thing: getting the town halls, which have no resources, to take over the powers of the Generalitat,” they rebuke Sabadell.
Despite all this, local authorities are not standing idle and are implementing plans to dampen the heat in the terraces – hard concrete surfaces with little shade – by placing elements that can create shaded areas and climate-controlled spaces, such as awnings, pergolas or trees, or water points, in addition to installing fans, or even, for the July festivals, small swimming pools or portable air conditioners.
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