The Chamber of Accounts, the Navarrese slopes court, considers as a “more reasonable” solution the Erripagaña neighborhood, located in the Pamplona region, divided territorially into four municipalities that are part of Pamplona, Burlada or “the two municipalities”. This is a historic claim of the 12,500 inhabitants of this neighborhood where four mayors govern, although they reject the proposal to depend on two of them and claim to depend on only one. For this reason, they hope that the agreement reached a few months ago between the mayors of Pamplona, Burlada, Valle de Egüés and Huarte will continue to open a process of participation and that the neighbors themselves will vote for which municipal council they want Erripagaña to join in order to be able to count on basic municipal services such as a health center, a school, a nursery school or a sports center.
The Comptos report highlights the “little equipment” in the neighborhood and points out that “only the municipal football field of Burlada, the skate park and part of the planned social housing have been built.” It adds that the health and educational provisions “do not correspond to the municipalities, but to the Government of Navarre.” In this sense, it indicated that the Regional Executive has already launched a call for tenders for the project to build a health center, scheduled to open in 2028, and has awarded the nursery school for the 0-3 year cycle, which will be operational next year. . It is also planned to build the Euskaltegi Zubiarte and the Official Distance Language School. However, these are “insufficient” services for residents, who have been demanding greater benefits for years.
The Court of Auditors also points out that the administrative fragmentation of Erripagaña implies “that there are inequalities between citizens in tax matters and access to certain public services.” Regarding connection and accessibility, it indicates that “it is an area with a high traffic road network with a certain insular character due to its location, which makes it disconnected from the surrounding urban fabric.”
For all these reasons, he considers that “for a more logical and rational management of resources”, “the most reasonable thing is for Erripañaga to belong to a single municipality (Pamplona or Burlada) or, failing that, to two. In this case, Pamplona would keep its share and Burlada would assume that of the Valley of Egüés and Huarte.”
The organization has studied the economic consequences of these alternatives, proposing some indicative figures. In this sense, if Pamplona absorbed all of Erripagaña, the most affected municipality would be Burlada, whose annual income would decrease by 2.6 million. “Burlada has a structural problem of leveling expenses and income, so this alternative would seriously affect its economic viability,” he warns. The Pamplona City Council, for its part, would increase its annual income by 3.6 million. In the event that Burlada took over the entire territory, its income would increase by 3.5 million and Pamplona would lose almost two million. Finally, if Pamplona keeps its share and Burlada assumes the rest, Burlada’s income would increase by 1.3 million and Pamplona’s “would remain practically the same.”
Asiron wants Pamplona to take back the neighborhood
In this regard, the mayor of Pamplona, Joseba Asiron (EH Bildu), expressed his desire for the Navarrese capital to take full ownership of the Erripagaña neighbourhood, although he added that “it must be the neighbourhood, through a well-informed participatory process, that must make this decision.”
Asiron indicated that it has already commissioned the study of the economic impact that the incorporation of Erripagaña would have on the municipal accounts and that it is expected that in 2025, at a meeting between the Government of Navarre and the four municipalities, the final decision will be made on the future of the neighborhood.
