Elected councillors and staff from the different Tenerife South sports departments met in Adeje last Friday, August 14th, to work on a unified approach to restarting municipal sporting activities in September.
Following the meeting, the overall conclusion was that, in general, the councils will proceed with caution to adapt to the new normality in the sporting world. Most installations remain closed for now and technical teams in each borough are working to ensure that when they do open it is with the maximum levels of security and health and safety measures in place. The current growth in the number of infections in the Canaries means that any measures introduced by councils will be designed to avoid any further major propagation of the virus.
Adolfo Alonso Ferrera, Adeje’s sports councillor, explained that the meeting of the sports departments was in response to “concerns within sports departments in the region and the need to find out the requirements within each zone. We did find out that in general we share the same worries given the current uncertainty of the situation, and we held serious debates regarding the best way forward, how to restart sports activities in the boroughs with guarantied safety for the public, and over the coming days we will also be meeting with other representative bodies, sports federations, the Tenerife Cabildo, the regional government, etc.”.
After the meeting a ‘road map’ was drawn up to move towards restarting some sports activities. The group looked at the opening of sports activities in parallel with the start of the next academic year, evaluating the possible impact and consequences on the younger population. The councils are also waiting to see how sport at professional level will control access to installations and what different protocols are to be introduced, how limits will be observed, etc. In this regard too they want to seek information from the federations and other governmental organisations regionally on how they are evaluating the start of the sporting calendar.
The meeting agreed to work on the design and implementation of a new ‘Juego Limpio’ (Fair Play) campaign adapted to the new Covid-19 situation. Posters will be erected in different stadiums and young athletes will be given information about the new rules to be followed and general recommendations as well as an ‘education through sports’ programme to help young people follow the new measures.
The representatives agreed the de-escalation phases of the Covid-19 measures, when conditions permit, advocating the resumption of competitive activity when considered safe to do so.
Finally all the councils present were in agreement about the need to send a positive message to the public, to sports clubs and teams- “we want to resume normal activity as soon as is possible, but obviously and only when we have enough guarantees in place to have the correct measure to protect all those taking part. Sport is healthy but health comes before every other consideration. We are working together to be able to enjoy sports again but we do need the public’s help and the help of all the relevant bodies, to be able to achieve our goal”, said Alonso Ferrera.
