City council and festive entities agree on measures to avoid the resurgence of the Covid-19 in the municipality

• The Agrupación de Comparsas and the Consistory demand that the neighbors respect the security norms to prevent agglomerations

The Mayor and the Councillor for Festivals of the Castalla Town Hall, Antonio Bernabeu and Noelia Álvarez, respectively, have met with the presidents of the groups, the president of the Group of Comparsas and representatives of the State Security Forces and Bodies in the municipality (Local Police, Regional Police, Civil Guard of Villena and Castalla), to address the impact of the crisis of the Covid-19 in the framework of the Moors and Christians festival, which will not be held in the city. The meeting also dealt with aspects related to security in the streets, in hotels and restaurants and in festive establishments.

All festive celebrations have been suspended in the town during the Coronavirus pandemic and as part of the State of Alert declaration. In this regard, the first mayor of Castalla has recalled that “it is not allowed to perform activities that do not have the appropriate licenses and authorizations,” referring to the local holidays that are coming, like St. James, on July 25. These prohibitions affect both charangas and bands that are not duly authorized by the Castelllut Council.

In this sense, those present at the meeting have agreed to make a joint appeal “to the responsibility of the population in general, and of the festive family in particular, to avoid situations that could put public health at risk and to attend to safety, hygiene and protection measures, and to respect the capacity of the premises”. For this reason, Bernabeu has reminded that it is not allowed to exceed the capacity of the festive ones in the barracks; in addition it is essential to maintain the social distance as well as the use of mask when this separation is not possible.

Both the festive representatives and the municipal leaders agree that they will inform immediately if there is any change in the current conditions regarding the celebration of the festive parades, as well as the traditional arquebusiness acts. Regarding this issue, Noelia Álvarez has indicated that “we intend to establish protocols for these acts, which will range from the management and distribution of gunpowder during the festivities, to the organization and control of the acts of shooting”, when they can be held. The assistants, festive and political leaders, have detailed the form that have the festive ones to obtain the license and the course of avancarga. As the Councillor for Festivities reminds us, “the responsibility for the shooters to comply with the requirements belongs to the groups, which is why we are going to establish another control protocol”.