DIY street-cleaners complain to Almeria city hall

RESIGNED residents in Almeria City’s Calle Tijola clean the streets and water the plants themselves.

“City hall only cleans what the mother-in-law sees,” complained a resident using the time-honoured Spanish phrase.

She mops the pavement each morning, while another neighbour waters the municipal flowerbeds in front of his apartments.

They have even voiced their protests on the mayor’s Facebook. “I’ve told the mayor a thousand times that despite paying our taxes like everyone else, they’ve abandoned us in this neighbourhood,” said another resident.  Neither did she like to see her elderly parents having to do what the city hall should be doing, she said.

“But since they don’t do it or else they do very little, there’s nothing for it but to go down with a mop, bucket of water and bleach,” she told the local Spanish media.

The health and consumers department was surprised by the Calle Tijola complaints.  “The cleaning service is very good there,” a department official insisted.  “The streets in that neighbourhood are swept manually each day and washed down every three days.”