Mojácar appears to have made a monumental cockup with the new section of their paseo marítimo (promenade) and ended up paying 80% of the bill, instead of 50% with the other 50% being covered by the government.
You see, the agreement signed with the Ministerio de Medio Ambiente (Ministry of the Environment) gave an estimated cost of €1.661.770 for the works, with the townhall and the Ministry both paying 50% of the bill.
Mojácar later scaled back the project to a cost of €993.240 due to budget restraints, and recently contracted out the works, assuming that it would only have to pay €496.620 (50%).
But when they sent the bill to the Ministry, it replied by pointing out that in the agreement, it stated that any reduction in cost in the overall project would come out of the Ministry’s 50%, and the townhall had to pay their original 50% in full: €831.000.
This is standard procedure nowadays to stop townhalls submitting inflated projects, then cutting them down and saving the cash. The intention is to ensure that townhalls are realistic about their projects from the start.
Mojácar didn’t realise this, and so Mayor Rosa Mari (PP) has ended up shooting herself in the foot – Mojácar ends up with a smaller paseo marítimo but the local taxpayer pays exactly the same. Mayor Rosa recently had to take a pay cut after a new law came in cutting the wages of politicians – she was one of the most overpaid Mayors for a village the size of Mojácar in Spain. She was on 50.400 euros a year (more than the whole tourism budget) after she voted herself a massive 42% pay raise. Under the new law, she can’t earn any more than 45.000 euros. Mojacar has 8360 residents, so she costs los mojaqueros…. about 6 euros per head.
Just 800 metres of new paseo with 58 parking spaces (fewer than there currently are) and in front of the Pueblo Indalo, which will no doubt take up the whole parking just with staff cars.
Local bar owners are up in arms about the work, which will start just before the busy Easter season and will affect businesses along the whole of the beach strip. Bars in the affected area continue to not know whether or not they
Mojacar’s paseo started in 1984 and continues to be an unfinished mess.
Jessica Simpson from Mojacar Positiva se mueve severely criticised the whole mess and said:
WE are paying 831.000€ for 800 metres of paseo!!
Looks like there will be 58 parking spaces, along the whole stretch of paseo that is the total amount of cars that can park. Let’s remember this is in front of the Pueblo Indalo that has capacity for 1000’s, many of whom bring their own cars… and I won’t even start to go in to detail about how ridiculous it is to start work now just before Easter!
The Season is about to start, and it seems that affected beach bars can not open this season and the beach will be closed initially.
Major projects like the Paseo we believe, should be consulted with all of the affected parties before a decision is taken, not leaving business owners in the dark not knowing what will happen to their business through the only months of available trade. There has been no liaison with local businesses or residents about the plans, meaning bars do not know if they will be able to open, if it is worthwhile investing in their businesses for this season, and of course, they are holding off hiring staff until they know what is going to happen.
I also note that the Mayor has now taken OUR proposal to modify the parking next to Aku Aku, which we submitted two years ago and had rejected, and has presented it as her own idea.
You can see the plans for the new paseo here (scroll down to formularios).