"I believe that both the issue of decentralization, deepening what has already been done and advancing new measures, and the issue of local finances are structural for the life of the municipalities and, therefore, will deserve a lot of attention, both from the municipalities and from the Government", said the president of the National Association of Portuguese Municipalities (ANMP).

The mayor of Matosinhos was speaking to Lusa after a meeting with the Minister of State and Territorial Cohesion, Manuel Castro Almeida, in Lisbon, which served for ANMP to present "the various demands" for the new legislature and for the current local government term.

The PSD/CDS-PP/PPM executive, led by Luís Montenegro, "also presented proposals in its government program that touch on the municipalities' own revenues, whether it is the municipal tax on transactions, or the surtax, and therefore, it is a topic that will have to be "dealt with the way the Government will compensate the local authorities for the loss of these own revenues", she stressed.

In addition to decentralization and the Local Finance Law, Luísa Salgueiro also mentioned three other areas, under the responsibility of the Ministry of the Environment: "The issue of water, the issue of waste and the issue of energy are very present in the life of the municipalities and will require a lot of attention and a lot of negotiation", she said.

"The Government has shown itself willing to study, as we had planned, the creation of a working group to analyze the proposals of the National Association of Municipalities and create a new Law [on Local Finances]. We saw this same openness on the part of the Minister, therefore, we will continue the work that was being done", said the socialist mayor, in relation to the work developed on the matter with the previous executive, led by the socialist António Costa.

After more than three hours of meeting with Manuel Castro Almeida, and the Secretaries of State Hélder Reis (Planning and Regional Development) and Hernâni Dias (Local Administration and Territorial Planning), in addition to several members of the ANMP's board, Luísa Salgueiro considered that "the meeting went very positively".

Also on the table were ANMP's positions on the "execution of the Recovery and Resilience Plan [RRP] funds, the preparation of [Portugal] 2030, [and] the Statute of Local Elected Officials".

The president of ANMP also highlighted the area of education, with applications for the first package of the rehabilitation plan for educational establishments underway, after "a mapping with 451 schools" that need "funding of close to 2,000 million euros, which was signed with the previous Government".

"In the meantime, the notices for the first 450 million, which are financed by the RRP, have been opened. Today is the deadline for submitting these applications. The first minutes of the financing agreements will be signed soon, many other schools will still be left out", stressed the mayor.

In this sense, the leader defended that "it is necessary to guarantee financing, whether through 2030, through the State Budget, or through the planned loan with the European Investment Bank".

"It is necessary to ensure that this will happen, the commitment we have from the Minister [of State and Territorial Cohesion] is that everything that was signed by the previous Government will be fulfilled by this one", added the socialist, adding that it is important to give "continuity to the many obligations that are foreseen and that correspond to the many needs on the part of the local authorities, of the schools", mainly "those that are identified in the mapping that was prepared".

Regarding the RRP, Luísa Salgueiro admitted that "the execution is very worrying, especially at the level of housing and the response capacity of IHRU [Institute of Housing and Urban Rehabilitation]".

"IHRU is an institute that has had great constraints in terms of response. There are many investments by local authorities that are at a standstill, awaiting approval by IHRU and, on the other hand, there are investments under the responsibility of IHRU itself that are not moving forward", she pointed out.

"The country needs to meet the goals it has committed to under the RRP, the municipalities have the responsibility to implement them, and they are dependent on this approval, therefore, it is urgent to create mechanisms to accelerate this relationship between the city councils and IHRU", insisted the president of ANMP.

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