Neighborhood associations criticize the Cort for delaying aid: "They've put us in a straitjacket."

Palma's neighborhood associations expressed their outrage before the Court of Justice on Tuesday because they have still not received the subsidies for the 2025-2026 grant period, for which they are demanding "immediate payment." The neighborhood associations denounced that these grants "are suffering the longest delays in recent years" and asserted that they owe invoices and have stopped carrying out activities for this reason. "They've put us in a straitjacket," denounced the president of the Federation of Palma Neighborhood Associations, Maribel Alcázar.

This year, Cort published the call for aid on March 8 and the provisional resolution was published on May 30, but "it was necessary to rectify it up to four times due to errors, just as its final resolution has had to be modified for the same reason, increasing the processing delay by 1

Along the same lines, the entities have charged against the bases of the call for subsidies. Article 24.6 of the specifications imposes that if an association does not justify the expenditure of at least 90% of the subsidy, it will not receive it the following year. "This is an invention of Cort because there is no regulation that imposes such a punishment," Alcázar claimed. This requirement that the neighbors ask to be eliminated imposes "an administration that is not capable of meeting the deadlines established to resolve the subsidies," they insisted.

The neighbors point out that they also do not have the forms to present the modifications to the which, they claim, they have "the right and need, due to the delay in the payment of resources, to enter data into the report and prepare a financial justification for the entities." Similarly, they emphasize that the subsidies for inventory materials, which, in their opinion, should be mobilized "urgently," have not yet been announced. "In accordance with the City Council's inability to manage and the experience of previous years, we fear that they will not be processed until the end of December," Alcázar lamented.

For all these reasons, the president of the Federation denounced the "absolute despotism of an administration that does not comply" and recalled that neighborhood associations are not the beneficiaries of the subsidies. "We don't profit from these resources, nor do we go on vacation," she insisted. Furthermore, she considered that the relationship between the cost and the performance of the projects carried out by these entities "is clearly favorable to the public coffers." "The City Council could not carry them out for that price because a large part of the economic value rests on volunteer work." of the associations," she insisted.

For her part, the Councilor for Finance, Civil Service and Internal Government of Corte, Mercedes Celeste, has justified that the delay in the aid "is not due to technical errors." "Now that we have counteracted it, we guarantee that everything will go well and so that we can move on to immediate payment," she said. In addition, she added that the residents "know that they will not receive the subsidies on January 1." On the other hand, she stressed that Cort called an extraordinary governing meeting in August to discuss the issue of subsidies to these entities.

Regarding the requirement imposed by Corte to justify at least 90% of the expenses of each association, Celeste explained that the City Council "cannot give money to be saved for later activities." "We must ensure that they can execute a program when they present it," she concluded.