By Richard Gutiérrez
richardsanjuanstar@gmail.com
Popular Democratic Party (PDP) President Jesús Manuel Ortiz González announced on Wednesday the creation of key work committees focused entirely on the effective restructuring of the party.
The PDP president had campaigned in part on a series of initiatives, some of which include the creation of the “Metropolitan Task Force” and the “Group of 15,” and he made a point of stating confidently where the party’s priorities are to be placed.
“Through the campaign that concluded a few weeks ago, I was very clear in stating the four pillars that I will address as the president of the Popular Democratic Party. Those four pillars are reorganization, the electoral code, the institutional government plan and the future committee,” Ortiz González said at a press conference held at the PDP’s headquarters in Puerta de Tierra. “Immediately as we arrived, we began to work on one of these aspects, the electoral code, which we have been working really hard on.”
The PDP president also noted Tuesday night’s party governing board meeting, where one of the important points was that they were opposed to any hike in the electricity bill as proposed in the draft debt adjustment plan for the Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority.
The PDP governing board also approved a document that Ortiz González said he considers very important: the party’s protocol with regard to domestic violence.
The PDP president said he believes that the party is entering a new era, and that it is up to all party members to work hard and as a team to prevail in the 2024 elections.
“As I mentioned before, one of my priorities lies in the reorganization of the party. That is why, last night, I presented our plan to the governing board,” Ortiz González said. “Each one of the initiatives will require the help of many people. That is why today we are announcing two initiatives to begin the reorganization of the Popular Democratic Party, the creation of The Metropolitan Task Force and The Group of 15. All of them will be focused on very specific parts of the reorganization of our party.”
He said the Metropolitan Task Force will primarily focus on designing a specific process that involves working together with the leadership of San Juan, Bayamón and Guaynabo in order to have a firm grasp on the individual realities of each of the metro area municipalities, all while keeping in mind the number of PDP votes and PDP electors in different parts of those towns.
“I have always been very emphatic in asserting that every municipality needs its own treatment, the work plan that we need in San Juan is not necessarily the work plan we need in Bayamón,” Ortiz González said. “The metropolitan area is a very important area for the PDP, so we must work hard to restore it individually.”
The Metropolitan Task Force will be composed of Coamo Mayor Juan Carlos García; Sen. Juan Zaragoza Gómez; mayors Carmen Maldonado González of Morovis and Josian Santiago Rivera of Comerío, respectively; Rep. Héctor Ferrer Santiago; San Juan municipal legislator Manuel Calderón Cerame; and attorneys Armando Valdés and Jehú Santiago.
Ortiz González added that the Group of 15 will oversee the production of a survey that allows the PDP to identify certain wins and losses in the electoral process of the municipalities, since there are towns that have situations that must be addressed urgently. The group will focus primarily on identifying those more urgent situations and help the leadership of each municipality with them.
The members of the Group of the 15 are: PDP Vice President Migdalia González, former Gov. Alejandro García Padilla, Aguada Mayor Christian Cortés, Mayor’s Association President Luis Javier Hernández Ortiz, PDP Public Services Organization President Juan Vega and the early candidates for the party’s board of representatives, Gabriel López Arrieta, Yaramary Torres and Juan Gómez, among others who will soon be integrated.
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