More than 60 workers from the Municipality of San José will not continue in their jobs starting next June 28 by order of the mayor, Luis Diego Miranda Méndez.
La Teja spoke with one of them, who the first thing he did was send a direct message: “Mr. Mayor, please do not leave my children without a home, without food and without Christmas.”
A worker from the municipality of San José tells us what he is experiencing after being told that his contract will not be renewed. Photo for illustrative purposes only. (Rafael Pacheco Granados)
We save the identity of the employee to avoid problems at the municipality.
“A year ago, on June 3 of last year, we started working in the municipality, that day 33 people entered and you don’t know how happy we were, but it only lasted a year.
“Christmas 2023 was one of the most beautiful of my life, I finally had a bonus, I had a decent dinner and we were up to date with the monthly house rent payments. My two children even received a gift, don’t you see that I was selling empanadas before entering the city. Now they are going to uproot my stability, I don’t know what to do, I can’t sleep, I work on pure thiamine and energy drinks.”
The worker explains that the more than 60 hired workers (who are under contract) were tasked with improving neighborhoods: fixing sidewalks, pipes, Law 7,600 ramps, in short, leaving the Josefina neighborhoods looking beautiful.
“Since last May 31 they gave us the terrible news that we will no longer continue as of June 28. My life and that of all my classmates changed, we are desperate, there are many families here. I will not be able to pay the rent, there will be no gifts, no dinner, no Christmas in December,” says the municipal employee.
“First they told us that it was due to the budget and then the mayor says that it is because we did not measure up. I got a 99 in my evaluation, my crewmates got 95, 96 and 98. Don Luis Diego, please let us show you that we are worth it, if you see that we are not useful, then the dismissal is well deserved, “I totally accept,” the worker says directly to the mayor.
Alexánder Cano, councilor of the Josefina municipality, denounced the layoffs in a video. (Screenshot)
Alexander Cano, councilor of the Municipality of San José and the National Liberation Party, made a video in which he denounces that starting next June 28, 60 workers will be laid off in the Josefina municipality.
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“Lies or truths? Political bills or political persecution? The truth is that more than 60 officials from our Municipality of San José were informed that as of June 28 they will be fired. They are not going to work in our municipality anymore,” the councilor begins by saying in his video.
“I remember the current mayor when he gave a statement and said: ‘don’t be afraid of change. No one will be fired. Everyone will have job stability.’ Today that is not being fulfilled,” Cano denounces.
In the video, the councilor assured that last Tuesday (May 28) a modification was approved in the municipal council so that no interim employee would be fired.
“Today they tell us that the interim neighborhood improvement projects were not included in that modification because it is a completely separate program. Here there is no distinction between separate programs, this is a program of the Municipality of San José that was also created by law,” the councilor recalled.
Mayor Diego Miranda explained why contracts cannot be renewed. (Alonso Tenorio)
Mayor explains
The mayor of San José, Diego Miranda, sent us his version of this issue: “These workers were hired during the pre-election campaign period to execute the resources transferred by a specific law. Unfortunately, due to the lack of strategic planning and the misuse of these resources, more than 60% of what was transferred was spent on payrolls (salaries) with a very low percentage of execution on infrastructure.
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“Johnny Araya’s administration was clear that the resources to pay these payrolls were only available until June of this year and this is proven by documents in our possession. Even so, they failed to inform those workers that the money would no longer be available after June, leaving the responsibility to the new administration, playing with the job expectations of those people.”
“The poor execution and terrible planning of the works carried out by these crews, in turn, produced few palpable improvements in the sidewalk infrastructure of the canton for which those resources were transferred.
Alexander Cano, councilor of the municipality of San José, denounces massive layoffs
“Our analyzes in these first weeks show that materials and labor costs have exceeded initial estimates, which has contributed to a rapid decrease in available funds, which is why budgeted resources have been insufficient, which “has led to ruinous results.”
Regarding the video of the councilor, the mayor assures: “these videos and messages that circulate and prepared by the Arayismo that seeks to continue ruling the municipality of San José, want to put the municipal working population in anxiety, without explaining the real events.
“This administration is committed to cleaning up and strengthening municipal services for citizens.”
