This is not the first time that the Department for Foreigners has met with the foreign groups in the area to work in a coordinated manner on the services provided to the retired foreign residents of Mijas who find themselves alone and in need of help in many aspects. "We meet periodically, every three months, with these associations of foreigners to work in a coordinated manner", explained the councillor responsible for the Department for Foreigners in Mijas, Mario Bravo (PP), after the meeting held at the Branch Offices in La Cala on Thursday 18th. 

The meeting was attended by representatives of the Lions Club of La Cala, the British Legion, Age Concern and Age Care, among others. "This collaboration is absolutely important to us. We would not be able to do what we do without the collaboration with the Foreigners Department. It has been a wonderful idea to bring all these clubs together here, they are all professional and friendly and a lot of synergies come out of this", said one of the members of the La Cala Lions Club, Sandi Tevendale. 

Another volunteer from the same group, Julie Barry, spoke along the same lines: "We have a lot of charity projects, we have three charity shops in La Cala where we have around 50 volunteers and we raise funds to help the community. We also offer help in specific individual cases, children with reduced mobility who need help, we collaborate with associations, we offer help for sport, education, elderly people who are alone... Our priority is to help here in Mijas, which is our community and where we live". 

Elderly foreigners alone

One of the main objectives of these groups is to help the elderly foreigners in Mijas who have no family. "The problem we have here is that there is a large part of the population that has no family, which is the first level of solidarity, and so they turn to the official solidarity which is the Town Hall, but a town hall cannot reach every corner of the municipality", specified Bravo, who valued the importance of working side by side with the collectives.

"These associations are the real families of many people, especially the elderly and retired, who have come here to spend that part of their lives and who need someone to help them with all kinds of problems. That is why it is important to establish a fluid collaboration between the Town Hall and these associations", added the councillor. 

As for the help these people need, "the problems they present are many", Bravo explained. Many do not know how they can obtain the senior citizens' card, the digital certificate, the blue card to apply for disabled parking... "They have many problems and the Department for Foreigners is here to help them, not only by giving them money through grants, but we also offer them legal and technical assistance, always with the aim of reaching as many people as possible".

Another of the issues on the table during the meeting was the way in which the Mijas Town Hall manages the subsidies to social groups. "As a novelty, this year, 2024, the Town Hall has decided not to award nominative subsidies, but to establish a competitive procedure, where the associations will present their projects and the Town Hall, with criteria that we are finalising, will distribute the money in the best possible way, trying to achieve a large social impact. In other words, we want this money to help the associations to work better and to reach more places", Bravo explained.

 According to the latest data from the municipal census, the councillor pointed out, there are 94,000 people registered in Mijas, 56,000 are Spanish and the rest are foreigners. "In general, the associative fabric in Mijas is very broad and there are not only associations of Spaniards for Spaniards, but also of foreigners for foreigners. Therefore, it is very positive that we have these coordination meetings periodically", concluded Bravo.

Share it with this link: https://mijasint.com/?a=29664