Collboni boasts about his two years as mayor: "We're headed in the right direction."

BarcelonaAbout to reach the halfway point of his term, the mayor of Barcelona, ​​Jaume Collboni, appeared this Wednesday in the Saló de Cent at City Hall to assess his government's performance so far. He considered his assessment "satisfactory" and boasted that it is beginning to yield results in some of the main concerns of Barcelona residents, such as security, cleanliness, and housing. "The policies we have implemented are going in the right direction," he said.

Collboni sought to base this analysis of his first two years in office on certain data, such as the 4.9% reduction in crime in the city by 2024, and the fact that cleanliness is now the main concern for only 5% of renters, down to 6%. The mayor also boasted that "the city's economic health is very good" and celebrated the fact that its GDP will have grown by 3.8% in 2024.

For over an hour, Collboni championed some of his flagship projects of his term, such as the Endreça Plan or the Housing Plan, with the declaration of the city as a stressed area, the mobilization of land to try to build 1,000 public housing units each year, or the commitment to allow the licenses for 10,000 tourist apartments in the city to expire in November 2028.

The mayor, who acknowledged that he would like to run for re-election in 2027, admitted that there are "very structural problems" in the city that need between two and three terms to be resolved. However, he boasted that in two years his government already has 85 percent of its action plan "finished or underway," and he sidestepped any reference to the fact that it has not been able to approve any budget through ordinary channels, including the Municipal Action Plan (PAM).

Pending tasks

During his lengthy presentation, Collboni also failed to address some of the commitments he has yet to fulfill, such as the project to renovate block interiors, the modification of the 30% reserve for social housing, or the amendment to the cohabitation ordinance. He only addressed these issues during question time, and he did so to ask the opposition to help him push through the two reforms. The possibility of reaching agreements in the major debates—one of the handicaps of this first part of his term—will be one of the defining factors that will define the final stretch of his term.

Therefore, the mayor took advantage of his appearance to publicly extend his support to Junts. While reiterating that as a progressive mayor, his priority remains reaching agreements with the Esquerra and Barcelona en Comú groups, Collboni also wanted to address a few words to the group led by Jordi Martí Galbis, with whom he celebrated the fact that they are already in talks about the possibility of reforming the regulations on the 30% reserve for protected housing.

The push from the Generalitat

Within Collboni's government, there is a conviction that, despite the burden of having only 10 councilors—the smallest government in the city's history—and the difficulty in passing some votes in plenary sessions, they have managed to unblock projects that had been dragging on in the city for years. "A city like Barcelona couldn't afford, with the limited amount of land we have, to have projects stalled for 10, 15, or 20 years," said Collboni, who listed cases such as the relocation of the Hospital Clínic—and its impact on space for facilities in the Eixample—from the Eixample Teixonera, the Rambla de Badal—still pending the final details—or the Citroën Island.

The fact that socialist governments also exist in the Generalitat and the Spanish government has helped compensate for the isolation. Collboni has capitalized on this harmony in his second year in office, making announcements regarding infrastructure—such as the metro—health—with the construction of new CAPs as a key element—and housing. Collboni praised his government's ability to engage with other institutions, including European ones, where he has sought to play an important role in recent months.

During his presentation, Collboni also embraced triumphs such as the consensus that Barcelona has reached its ceiling in terms of visitors and that what's needed now is to "govern tourism." Along these lines, he called for measures such as plans for managing areas of the city where overcrowding is unsustainable—the so-called high-traffic areas—and a commitment to reducing the number of cruise ships arriving in the city; a negotiation that the City Council is still holding with the Port.

Unanimous criticism from the opposition

During his two years in office, Collboni has also failed to recruit any group to his government, as noted by the unanimous criticism of the mayor's appearance. The leader of Junts on the council, Jordi Martí Galbis, has even gone so far as to officially declare his mandate over because he doesn't believe the mayor can reactivate the city if he hasn't done so by now. However, he hasn't ruled out reaching an agreement with the PSC (Spanish Socialist Workers' Party) on the reform of the 30% subsidized housing.

From Barcelona en Comú, its leader, Janet Sanz, has also criticized the work done so far by the municipal executive, which she has described as more of a "management" than a government. In this regard, she mocked the figure of 85 percent of government action "finished or underway," and, echoing one of the PSC's most common criticisms regarding the 30 percent reservation, asserted that "85 percent of zero is zero."

ERC deputy spokesperson Jordi Coronas also expressed doubt about this level of execution in just two years, which he attributed to two possibilities: "Either what they're explaining isn't true or the mandate plan was very unambitious," he said. From the PP, Daniel Sirera said that "the city is the same or worse than before" and that "the only thing that has improved is Collboni himself."