Latest news with #Dávila
Local Spain
02-06-2025
- Politics
- Local Spain
Tenerife airport chaos strengthens case for Brits' e-gate access in Spain
Several UK tabloids recently reported how on May 26th hundreds of British holidaymakers faced "third-world', 'inhumane' and "cattle-like" conditions at Tenerife South Airport. As four UK flights landed in quick succession, a bottleneck formed at passport control which meant passengers queued for more than two hours in stifling and overcrowded airport lounges. Travellers complained that only two booths were manned for hundreds of British visitors, as well as speaking out about the 'claustrophobic' conditions and no access to toilets. The problems were reported to have been made worse by the fact that children were unable to use e-gates to check their passports. Rosa Dávila, president of Tenerife's Council, called an emergency meeting after the incident saying that chaos and long queues have become a common problem at the airport during peak tourist periods. Dávila called the situation 'unacceptable' and blamed Madrid for failing to provide sufficient immigration officers to the Canary island since Brexit. 'This is a structural issue,' she explained. We can't continue to operate with the same staffing levels we had pre-Brexit'. The incident strengthens the case for Britons to be able to use e-gates in Spain - without the need for a passport stamp - as soon as possible, in order to avoid repeats and potential crushes at passport control. Spain is one of only a handful of EU countries already allowing limited e-gate access for UK citizens, but only at selected airports. Even then, they often still require a passport stamp, despite their passport also being processed automatically. During the recent UK-EU 'reset' talks, the UK and the European Commission promised to "continue their exchanges on smooth border management for the benefit of their citizens, including the potential use of e-gates where appropriate". They stated that "there will be no legal barriers to e-gates use for British nationals travelling to and from the European Union member states after the introduction of the European Union Entry/Exit System". This means that it's likely that UK citizens will not have access to e-gates until the introduction of the new EES (Entry/Exit System), which scheduled for later this year in October 2025. "After that it's up to the member states. But this gives us the possibility, I'd say the probability, that people will be able to use the e-gates in future, which is not a possibility at the moment," Cabinet Office minister Pat McFadden told the BBC. Unfortunately, this won't help the situation this summer when thousands of Brits will be descending on Spain for their annual holidays, with the potential to cause chaos at even more airports across the country, not just in Tenerife. Spain has long been a favourite holiday destination for British tourists and the Spain-UK route is one of the busiest flight routes in the world. Spain received more than 17.5 million British holidaymakers during the first 11 months of 2024. There are also over 400,000 UK nationals officially registered as living in Spain according to Spain's National Institute of Statistics (INE) data from 2024. Recent events at Tenerife South Airport highlight the recurring problems that come about since barriers were put in up between two countries linked together by more than 200 daily flights. Even though granting British travellers access to all Spanish airports' e-gates seems like a feasible way to reduce these Brexit-fuelled holdups, there are fears that the implementation of the EES across the EU in October will also cause chaos before the system is running smoothly. However, once EES is fully operational, and queues for passport stamps are no longer necessary, it's possible that scenes such as that at Tenerife South will be a thing of the past.
Yahoo
23-05-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Number of older homeless adults increased nearly 20% this year in Hampden County
SPRINGFIELD — More and more, Center for Human Development homeless outreach workers in the state's western four counties are seeing an uptick in older homeless adults. That's according to Will Dávila, CHD's vice president of diversion, shelter and housing. 'I can tell you we've been increasingly concerned over the last year or two,' he said. 'We've seen slowly the numbers creeping up.' Across all age groups, homelessness increased this year in Hampden County compared to 2024. For adults 55 and older, the annual percent increased by 18.4%, several points higher than the bump to the overall population, according to preliminary data from an annual point-in-time count conducted in January. The counts are coordinated at the local level but done across the country, and data is reported to the federal government. It was the second year in a row in which the older adult group's numbers increased more than the overall homeless population, said Gerry McCafferty, the city's housing director and the point person for the Springfield-Hampden County Continuum of Care. On the night the census was taken this past January, 34 people aged 55 and older were sleeping on the streets in the county, while 133 in that age group were sheltered, the preliminary data shows, according to McCafferty. Rising homelessness among older adults is a nationwide problem. One study in 2019 predicted the number of homeless people over the age of 65 would almost triple by 2030. Dennis P. Culhane, one of the researchers and a professor in the University of Pennsylvania School of Social Policy and Practice, told NPR earlier this year that the actual increase has been 'slightly higher than we predicted.' Some reasons for the increase: Baby boomers are aging, and there's a lack of affordable housing. 'I can speculate,' McCafferty said, speaking of the possible reasons for the uptick. 'Many older adults lived on fixed incomes. They are on Social Security or other retirement, and rents have gone up tremendously. I think that there likely is a greater challenge of affordability, as rents went up, and incomes did not go up. I think there is a good likelihood a lot of it has to do with housing affordability.' John Baker is a community health worker who does homeless outreach for Mercy Medical Center in partnership with the city. He is seeing some older adults on fixed incomes who have been pushed out onto the streets by rent increases. 'The math doesn't sustain itself,' he said. He also sees older people on the streets with co-occurring mental health or substance use problems. It's hard enough to be homeless in your 30s or 40s, Baker said. 'It's much more difficult when you're in your 60s or 70s.' Some older homeless adults have aged while experiencing chronic homelessness, service providers said. Anecdotally, McCafferty also is hearing about more older adults who are homeless for the first time. Baker and Dávila are seeing that in their work, too. 'It's concerning,' Dávila said. Dávila also worries about how possible cuts to social service programs could worsen the situation. 'On top of what we're already seeing, if benefits to these folks are eliminated, and rents go up, you're going to have a perfect storm for many more homeless individuals,' he said. 'It's all going to converge at a very unfortunate moment.' 'His mercy was never returned': Jordan Cabrera sentenced to 12-15 years for fatally shooting Jahvante Perez This is how much untreated wastewater went into the Connecticut River last year PVPC working on two-decade plan for bikers and pedestrians Big Y recalls made-to-order sandwiches for salmonella concerns Read the original article on MassLive.
Los Angeles Times
17-03-2025
- Entertainment
- Los Angeles Times
A modern Stonehenge rises in Desert Hot Springs: Here are the standouts in Desert X 2025
Desert X, the biennial exhibition of site-related installation art commissioned for varied locations in and around Palm Springs, continues to shrink. From 16 artists for the inaugural in 2017, and the same number (plus three collectives) two years later, subsequent iterations have gotten steadily smaller. Just 11 artists are participating in the latest version, with only nine works ready at its March 8 opening. (The remaining two were expected to be completed soon.) Smaller isn't necessarily lesser, of course, although few of these projects are compelling. The somewhat more compact map of Coachella Valley sites being used this time is one benefit: No driving 198 miles to and from the vicinity of the Palm Springs Aerial Tramway and the edge of the Salton Sea, as was necessary in 2019. Still, Desert X 2025 does feel thin. Only three installations stand out — one at the foot of a hiking trail in a Palm Desert park, the other two in dusty landscapes in Desert Hot Springs. The knockout is 'The act of being together,' a monumental construction of stacked blocks of marble by Jose Dávila, 51, who is based in Guadalajara, Mexico. Twelve massive chunks of white stone were quarried there, transported in their raw state across the border and piled in six pairs adjacent to a Desert Hot Springs wind farm. The shrewd, vivifying juxtaposition pits crude, primal, static stone, its huge weight pressing the ground beneath your feet, against sleek, industrially elegant windmills spinning overhead to catch the invisible airstream and generate similarly imperceptible energy. Five chunky pairs are arrayed around a central stack. Inevitable are thoughts of ancient Stonehenge, or perhaps primordial cairns marking trails or burial grounds in premodern societies. You are at a ceremonial site, but here the ritual is distinctive and contemporary: The pomp and circumstance in biennial art exhibitions like Desert X beckon the faithful to assemble from far and wide. Borders get crossed, materially and conceptually. Dávila's sculpture is conscious of its role as an engine for 'the act of being together.' What's beautifully articulated is the precariousness of that event. Dávila has stacked the stones carefully, with no sense of physical danger in the way one massive rock is placed atop the other. Yet, these compositions are not neat and clean. Upper blocks project out several feet from their base, sit on the edge or stand tall and lean. These sculptural elements build on the history of simplified geometric forms in Richard Serra's exceptional minimalist 'prop' works, where massive plates of lead and steel lean against each other, providing contrarian weight to stand up and defy gravity's relentless pull. But, unlike the industrial materials that Serra leaned and stacked, this sculpture's classical legacy of marble is Dávila's chosen reference. Art's past is juxtaposed with the desert's advanced industrial turbines. Dávila's huge sculptural ensemble appears permanent, which would be great, although its elements may be dispersed when Desert X closes on May 11, as these projects typically are. (According to a spokesperson, the sculpture's ultimate fate is under discussion.) About five minutes away, a poetic gas station by Los Angeles artist Alison Saar awaits your car's arrival. 'Soul Service Station' derives from an earlier, considerably different work the artist made 40 years ago in Roswell, N.M., when she was not yet 30. Signs assembled from vehicle tires line a dusty pedestrian route from the paved road to her gas station — a cleverly suggestive Shell station, apparently, given the chrome conches adorning the pump handles. (Ten million years ago, the Coachella Valley was at the bottom of a sea.) The signs' messages are winking bits of inspirational doggerel by poet Harryette Mullen ('When your heart has fallen flat, we pump it up.') At the end of the short trail, the fuel offered inside Saar's compact service station, a shiny tin shack sheltered among trees, is spiritual nourishment. The sustenance is presided over by a sculpture of an Amazonian woman, who wields a squeegee rather than a lance. ('When you can't see ahead, we wipe your windshield clean and clear.') She, like the charming shack, is sheathed in sheets of old-fashioned ceiling tin, a staple of the artist's work. This signature material dates to 19th century America, when it emerged as a mass-produced, middle-class design element to compete with unique, aristocratic plaster ceilings. If accessible democratic architectural material can be identified, this is it. A half-hour away in Palm Desert, Swiss artist Raphael Hefti, 46, has stretched an impossibly long strip of reinforced fire-hose material, jet black on one side and mirror-bright silver on the other. The aerial strip, swaying overhead in the breeze, is roughly 1,300 feet long — more than 3 ½ football fields. The band is anchored from a high rocky cliff at one end, near the start of a well-used hiking trail, and a tall steel support drilled into the flat desert at the other. An engineering feat, for sure, the resulting catenary curve in the sagging line is a visual treat as well, buoyant and struggling against the pull of gravity for no other reason than to delight. Without the structural principles behind catenary curves, there would be no Gothic cathedrals or Renaissance domes — nor, for that matter, any lacy spiderwebs. Hefti's curve is shallow in the extreme, given the vast length, and suggests environmental, maybe even planetary scale. Twisting in space, the slender mirrored-line flashes in and out of sight, depending on the time of day, the angle of the sun and shifting weather conditions. At night in ambient light, it's barely visible, competing with a canopy of stars. In a rugged desert park, the linear sculpture feels at once bold and fragile, muscular and delicate. Hefti has titled the work 'Five things you can't wear on TV,' a sly reference to cautions against wearing pinstripes on camera, lest moiré patterns interfere with a television monitor's crisp electronic imagery. The title positions the perceptually fluctuating work as existing outside routine contemporary aspirations; instead, it occupies a witty place in a vaguely absurd counterculture. The exhibition, organized by Desert X artistic director Neville Wakefield and curator Kaitlin Garcia-Maestas, director at Socrates Sculpture Park in Queens, N.Y., includes additional installations of relatively routine fare by Sanford Biggers, Agnes Denes, Cannupa Hanska Luger, Sarah Meyohas, Ronald Real and Muhannad Shono. Still to come: Kimsooja and Kipwani Kiwanga. The postpandemic sluggishness in arts fundraising and audience numbers still being felt by many cultural institutions may explain this year's more modest ambitions. The once-exciting biennial program also shot itself in the foot in 2019, taking a multimillion-dollar donation from Saudi Arabia. Desert X is still co-organizing installations there, in what is a blatant case of art-washing to polish the soiled international reputation of a murderous, absolute monarchy where free expression is forbidden. Three works in the Coachella Valley are as worthwhile as any Desert X has yet produced, but that's barely enough for a festival.
