One of the objectives of the reform of the administration that the Government has promoted is that public attention reaches all over the territory. For this reason, throughout this legislature the executive will launch eleven Citizen Service Offices (OAC) integrated throughout the country. The Government has also set out to reach the smaller municipalities and, to do so, has designed five mobile offices. “One of the objectives of the reform of the administration is to make life easier for citizens”, defended the Councilor of the Presidency, Albert Dalmau, in statements to the media. The Government has estimated the investment of this boost in public attention at 13 million euros.
Until now, there were three citizen service offices located in Girona (Plaça Pompeu Fabra, 1), the Terres de l’Ebre (the office is located in Tortosa, at Plaça Gerard Vergés, 1) and in Central Catalonia (based in Manresa, at Plaça de la Salt, 2). Since the beginning of the legislature, the Government has opened a new one in Tarragona (Carrer Anselm Clavé, 1), which has eight workers; and has expanded the office that already existed in the Ciutat Vella district of Barcelona, on Carrer de Sant Honorat, where three informants and a new digital agent have joined. It is a provisional office until the final one scheduled for the end of 2027 at Carrer Ciutat, 1, and which will have eighteen informants.
Looking ahead to next year, the Government plans to open one in the first quarter of 2026 at the Seu d’Urgell (passage Alsina, 3), with three informants; another in Vilafranca del Penedès (plaça de la Vall del Castell, 2), which will incorporate fifteen informants and the executive expects it to be ready in the fourth quarter of 2026; in Puigcerdà (Carrer Pic d’Eina, 2), which will have two informants and will open its doors during the fourth quarter of next year; and in Barcelona, in the Eixample, where a temporary office (on Gran Via) will be up and running during the first quarter of 2026, with twelve informants and which will operate until the definitive one is opened, which will be located in the Muñoz Tower, planned for the first quarter of 2031 and which will have 25 informants.
By 2027, the Government also wants to open another office in Tremp, which will have four informants and which will provide a provisional service from Carrer Sant Jordi, 2, until the definitive one scheduled for the end of 2029 opens, which will be located at Passeig Pompeu Fabra, 19, and will have six informants. In two years’ time, an office in Lleida (Carrer Pere Cabrera, 34) has also been planned, which will have 25 informants. With the deployment of these new OACs, Catalonia will now have eleven spread across all the Catalan vegueries and will strengthen its staff by 162 workers. All together, it will mean an investment of 10.5 million euros.
Dalmau stressed that all these offices will be “integrated”, that is to say, that the so-called single window will work where all the procedures can be done in a “single point” and without asking for a mandatory prior appointment. “The objective is to prevent citizens from having to move from department to department or from having to ask them for information that the administration already has,” the councilor defended.
The mobile offices
The Government will complement these eleven new offices with five mobile offices which it expects to start moving from the second quarter of next year. These are vehicles that will move between 80 municipalities to serve the areas where there are no fixed public assistance offices. The vehicles will be equipped with “advanced technology and specialized personnel”, the Government points out, to meet the needs of these more rural and less connected areas. In total, the Government will invest around 2.43 million euros between 2026 and 2027.
Until now there was already a pilot test of a mobile office that had traveled through thirty municipalities in the Terres de l’Ebre since June last year. The aim, according to Dalmau, is to guarantee “territorial cohesion”, so that anyone who has to do a procedure does not have to go to Barcelona. Thus, these mobile offices will offer information on services and procedures, support for making arrangements and will also allow access to a video attention service with specialized staff.
