O Conselho municipal de saneamento de belo horizonte: história, funcionamento e perspectivas

Abstract

The Federal Law 11.445 establishes the national guidelines for the sanitation1 sector in Brazil. However, although the sectors legal framework entered into force only in 2007, some municipalities created specific regulation for their sanitation sector even before the Federal Laws promulgation. This is the case of Belo Horizonte, Minas Gerais, whose Municipal Politic for Sanitation was instituted in 2001 by the Law 8.260. Among several issues approached by both the nacional and local laws is the social control of the public sanitation services. To ensure sanitation sectors social control in Belo Horizonte wascreated, in April, 2004, the Municipal Council of Sanitation of Belo Horizonte (COMUSA). Since it is recently founded, mainly when compared to other existent municipal councils in Belo Horizonte (environmental, health, urban politics and housing, among others), COMUSA was conceived with expectations of a good operation, since it could be guided by the previous experience of the oldest councils. However, the Councilstill has some fragility, mainly structural, which brings barriers to its operation. This study aims to evaluate COMUSAs performance and the role played by this Council in social control and definition of public policies in Belo Horizontes sanitation area. In order to achieve the objective, documental researches were performed, as well as the observation of Councils meetings and interviews with key actors involved in COMUSAs creation and consolidation process. In addition, a brief record of the sanitation history in Belo Horizonte was set up, from the capitals creation to the COMUSAs institution, in order to identify the historical facts that interfered directly in COMUSAs forming process. Theresults point to a low participation of popular movements, unmotivated counselors and a weak Council that eventually plays a bigger role in legitimizing Executive Powers deliberations than generating new proposals. Thus, it is suggested to consider modifications in the COMUSAs structure to ensure the existence of basic tools that canhelp COMUSA to perform its function of sanitation sectors social control in Belo Horizonte.