Austerity romance: two towns merge in Spain seeking savings breakthrough

MADRID | Cesuras and Oza agreed this week the first merger between towns in Spain. The villages will become one local authority in a decision that was pushed by the need of public spending rationalisation, and that is likely to trigger a municipal restructuring in the region of Galicia.

In fact, the president of Galicia’s province of A Coruña, Diego Calvo, admitted there are at least nine other towns currently in negotiations. Calvo said Galicia should open a path to follow everywhere else in Spain, setting comparisons to the British model in which a map of 2,000 local authorities was simplified down to about 500. Calvo also hinted at the possibility of forcing those villages whose budgets are burdened by unsustainable deficits to merge.

A Coruña is a province with 94 municipalities and Calvo referred to the process of municipal mergers as ‘irreversible’.

Oza-Cesuras, as the new municipality will be registered, appears to have begun its new chapter in history with a stroke of luck. Begano, the distributor of Coca-Cola in the northwest, will build a large plant logistics projects in the area. Now, the prize will be shared by Oza-Cesuras’ 5,000 population, as they will do with the town hall, flag, political parties, services and budgets.