The region of Pinares, between Burgos and Soria, has concentrated this Sunday in the Revenga community, belonging to Quintanar de la Sierra, Rechemiel and Canicosa, to claim the Junta de Castilla y León to put all the necessary means in the prevention and extinction of forest fires. The protest has concentrated more than half a thousand people who have criticized the lack of means in the area in case of a forest fire.
Representatives of several municipalities and associations have transferred their preopation for the future of mountains that they consider “abandoned to their fate.” “The devastation of a fire is comparable to that of a war. It is not a matter of whether the mountain will burn, but when there are no medium and long term policies, we will not have a future. Europe already does, but here we still do not act,” said happiness Chicote, one of the spokesmen ..
The organizers have indicated that the objective of the concentration was to “give a touch of attention to the administration” and claim a change in the forest management model. “We are here because we are afraid, because every summer we wake up without knowing if it will be the last one in which we can see the green mountain. We cannot live with that uncertainty,” he said.
In the banners you could read resignation requests to the president of the Junta de Castilla y León, Alfonso Fernández Mañueco, and the Minister of the Environment, Juan Carlos Suárez-Quiñones. “Quiñones, solutions or resignation,” he collected. Also other posters questioning the purpose of taxes if there are no “means, firefighters and without investments” or remembering that “the mountains are our assets.”
Lack of means and privatization of the service
A good part of the interventions have agreed to point out the lack of technical and human means to stop the fires. “A motor pump for 30,000 hectares is not enough – as is the case of the bourgeois part of Pinares.. intervened
This outsourcing of the service and temporary contracts were also strongly criticized. “You spend more on turning off bulos than in extinguishing fires. Prevention is hardly any, contracts are insufficient and the staff works in precarious conditions. We ask that the law be fulfilled and that there is surveillance and prevention throughout the year, not only in summer,” said Chicote.
The memory of the big fires
With the fires throughout Castilla y León still in the treasury, they have indicated that in this region, with more than 100,000 hectares of pines “the same can happen.” “If ignition occurs in the right conditions, there will be no way to stop it. We have already lived it and we do not want to repeat it,” said Chicote.
The fear of losing a unique natural heritage planned over all interventions. “Our mountains are not a theme park for tourism. We are guarantors of this territory, we work, take care of it and defend it. We want our children to know the mountain that their grandparents worked,” said the mayor of Salas de los Infantes, Ada Marcos.
Call from the municipalities
The mayor of Palacios de la Sierra, Raquel Munguía (Vïa Burga), has called the rest of the municipal corporations to create a political unit around the defense of the mountains. “Always the same, always the same unfulfilled promises. I don't care about the color or acronym: what we need is to start working real. The pines here are not red, or purple, nor blue are blacks are black from the smoke of the fires,” he stressed.
For his part, the deputy mayor of Covilda, Carlos Llorentehas also denounced the shortage of environmental agents and material means in the Soriana zone. “In our region we are Pinariegos, we have roots and defend the mountain, but we cannot do it alone. Here we barely have 12 agents and most of the turrets are abandoned or covered with vegetation. We have been fortunate not to suffer serious fires in twenty years, but with the dire media we have we will not be able to stop them when they arrive,” he said.
Proposals from the territory
Beyond the criticism, the mayor of Quintanar, Antonio Gil, has transferred concrete proposals such as allowing grazing in the mountains, as a natural method of cleansing firewall. “The firewalls are full of weeds because they leave. If we let the cattle in, they would be clean and the risk of fire would be much less,” he said.
The councilor has also claimed that water deposits be enabled on forest tracks, open the prediction for cleaning and reinvest part of the funds obtained in the peoples themselves. “At least 15% of what is collected should return to the region to reinforce forest management, but that does not happen,” he lamented.
The concentration has ended with a call to the unit and shared responsibility. “The cities also have to close their shoulder. What is at stake is everyone's natural heritage,” said the vice president of the Royal Carreteros cabin, Ambrosio Montero.
