General Council of the Pyrénées-Orientales

Pyrénées-Orientales
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The General Council of the Pyrénées-Orientales (in French: Conseil Général des Pyrénées-Orientales) is the assembly elected for 6 years by the 31 Cantons of the Pyrénées-Orientales and its executive. Christian Bourquin,(PS) is the elected president since 1998.

Organization

President

The chairman of 'General Council of Pyrénées-Orientales' is Christian Bourquin (PS) re-elected consecutively since 1998. He is the head of the executive.

Former presidents

• Guy Male 1982 - 1987
• Rene Marques 1987 - 1998

The Vice-Presidents

• Jean-Jacques Lopez (PS)
• Jean Vila (PC)
• Robert Garrab (PS)
• Henri Demay (PS)
• Louis Caseilles (PS)
• Alexandre Reynal (PS)
• Alain Boyer (PS)
• Jean-Louis Alvarez (PC)
• Jean Codognès (DVG)

The General Council

The Assembly sets departmental policy. The General Council has 31 Conseillers généraux for the 31 Cantons of the Pyrénées-Orientales and its Chairman. The Conseiller général is the representative, elected universal suffrage for 6 years.

The powers of the General Council

The General Councils exercise the powers given by the laws of decentralization in the social welfare, the roads and water network, the Education, the fire and rescue services,^[1] economic development, public Museum, departmental archives, the management of protected areas.

Social welfare

• The Revenu de solidarité active,^[2] or RSA is to replace in 2009, the Revenu minimum d'insertion or RMI), the "Allocation de parent isolé" (API) to help Single-parent, the "prime pour l'emploi" or (PPE) an allocation to help working poor.^[3][4]
• The Office of Public Housing of Pyrénées-Orientales ^[5]

The roads and public transport

• The 1 € bus network
• The management of the road network in the Pyrénées-Orientales

Education and Sport

• The management of school canteens and 30 collèges of Pyrénées-Orientales ^[6]
• Two bibliobus that crisscross the department ^[7]
• The Médiathèque départementale Claude Simon.^[8]
• The 40 "sports departmental committees", and the Sports Health Center.^[9]
• Financial support for the USAP, and Catalans Dragons ^[10]

Economic development

The THEMIS Solar Power tower

• The "Platform Multimodale Pyrenees Mediterranean" ^[11]
• The departmental committee of tourism ^[12]
• The THEMIS solar power plant

The culture and heritage of the Pyrenees-Orientales

• Partner of Musée d'Art Moderne de Céret the art museum of Céret,^[13]
• The Palace of the Kings of Majorca ^[14]
• The Château Royal de Collioure^[15]
• The Serrabone Priory ^[16]
• Participation in the cultural network "Réseau culturel Terre Catalane".^[17]

Environmental protection and sustainable development

• Partner of the Parc naturel régional des Pyrénées Catalanes^[18]
• Partner of "syndicat mixte grand Site Canigó" that manages the Canigou range^[19]
• management of Paulillesprotected area^[20]
• The Regional Natural Reserve of Nyer
• The Natural Marine Reserve of Banyuls-Cerbère ^[21]

The Eurodistrict

The General Council has a policy of cooperation with the Generalitat of Catalonia, the Province of Girona and the Andorra to create a Catalan Eurodistrict.^[22]

July 27, 2007 in Céret took place the signature of the framework agreement for launching the Eurodistrict project^[23] Establishment of a Common Fund to support projects of cooperation across the Catalan space,^[24] and common development of cross-border projects,^[25] the General Council and the Casa de la Generalitat de Catalunya in Perpignan.^[26]

Use of Catalan

A study in 1997 found that 55% of the population understand, 39% can read and 34% can speak Catalan. It found a higher percantage of speakers in villages and lower in the capital city.^[27] Although Catalan has no official status it was first recognised in 1951 when it was introduced into the school curriculum. The Region of Languedoc-Roussillon created an agency for the promotion of the two regional languages, Catalan and Occitan.

The Charter for Catalan

At the session of 10 December 2007, the General Council approved the "Charter for Catalan" in which the Pyrénées-Orientales is committed to ensure the promotion, development and dissemination of the Catalan language and the Catalan culture. It says in the Preamble: "Catalan, is born more than a thousand years, is one of the pillars of our identity, heritage and richness of the department of Pyrénées-Orientales (Northern Catalonia). The term Northern Catalonia gets its first official recognition.^[28]

Automatic defibrillators

Defibrillator of General Council on the city hall of Collioure

The Pyrénées-Orientales is a county pilot in the installation of automatic defibrillators. On April 2, 2007, the General first decided to buy defibrillators to 22 municipalities located more than 20 minutes of a Relief.^[29] Since March 2008, and the installation of a defibrillator in Mosset, 141 municipalities are listed, with the objective to equip the 226 municipalities in the department and the 22 Council buildings General, with 400 aircraft.

Interest in certain municipalities decided to install additional defibrillators in stages and sites with high attendance.^[30]

The presentation of this initiative to the lounge mayors of France,^[31] a result of Pyrénées-Orientales, a pilot department for other cities, departments and French regions, which in turn considering the installation of automatic defibrillators.^[32]

Geolocation and digital coverage of the Pyrénées-Orientales

The installation requires a device from the common, power, a line and Internet ADSL . For this reason and hence the installation of this device has helped develop the digital life in some villages and consequently reduce the digital divide.

The GSE of defibrillators by GPS on Internet and car navigation systems, the mobile phones and the PDA also improves on Référencement and Digital coverage department.

See also

• Languedoc-Roussillon

Notes

References

• Sheet presentation of Eurodistrict in french and Catalan
• Charter for the Catalan

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Pyrénées-Orientales.

• Conseil Général des Pyrénées-Orientales
• INTERREG cross-border projects in progress