Centralizing the offices of forest guards to: To facilitate organization or save money with cuts? The first argument is that given by the Government of Navarra to justify the closure of the residence of Leitza, while the second reason for criticising the measure is that denounced by the neighbouring municipalities in the Foral Parliament.

On Wednesday, in the Committee on Rural Development and the Environment of the Foral Parliament, the mayor of Leitza, Mikel Zabaleta, presented the opinion of both the municipality of his locality and those of Arano, Areso and Goizueta: "One thing is to reorganize the working groups of the forest guards to seek efficiency and another to close a reference office and exclude the region."

“Such a measure only causes damage.” Because for Zabaleta, closeness facilitated coordination. "If public services are not to be maintained in rural areas, the survival of the people will be put at risk," he warned.

As the mayor pointed out, the closure that took place on 20 December is not surprising “because the government has been moving forest guards away from the forests for years”. In addition, he recalled that “forestry will become even more important with climate change”, especially when last summer there were the largest historical fires in Navarre and considering that the area of Leitza is a high-risk fire area.

Gloria Giralda, director of the Forest Day Care services of the Government of Navarra, answered that the recent “modification of the internal organization” does not “harm the service”, since the offices are not “places of attention to the public”, but “workplaces of the forest day”. Therefore, “keeping all staff together facilitates compliance with afternoons, weekends and casualties”.

But, as Mikel Zabaleta says, the argument Giralda gave to close the headquarters contradicts what the government said to the forest guards working in Leitza. According to the mayor of Leitza, the closure of the premises is due to the fact that in the last six months only one person was attended in the office, without taking into account that the daycare centers receive the calls in the office and go to the places of citizenship to arrange appointments with them.

Giralda clarifies that the measure is not a reduction, that “understands the concern of municipalities” and that before a year they will make a deeper assessment of the new organizational model.