The amount that the Town Hall will have to find is exactly 2,672.000 euros in order to return it to building developers that had signed agreements with Juan Carlos Benavides between 2004 and 2006.

The four failed building developments, for which the investors paid up front, are: Torres de Almuñécar, which was supposed to go up next to the fire station (2,300,000 euros); Constrop that would be building next to Cuesta del Marchante; Almuñécar Puerto Centro, which was the dry marina that was supposed to be situated within the Sandolvala (the San Cristóbal Mercadona area) and Alboscasa in La Herradura. These last three amount to 372,000 euros between them.

The present-day Mayor of Almuñécar, Juan José Ruiz Joya, “laments that 15 years later the “disastrous Benavides administration has had negative consequences for residents of Almuñécar and La Herradura.”

“In total it’s been 8,000,000 euros in capital plus interest that we have had to return; money that was paid up front to the Town Hall by land owners, building developers and companies,” said the Mayor.

The problem was, according to the Mayor that these projects were approved within the bounds of a PGOU (General Plan for Urban Development) that Mayor Benavides had had drawn up but was later rejected by the Junta de Andalucía because the Town Hall had not supplied any of the necessary documents required to be studied.

The Councillor for Hacienda, Rafael Caballero, said that owing to the hole these extra expenses will make in the municipal coffers, “we will have to tighten our belts and makes cuts in expenditures;” i.e., services provided.

(News: Almunecar, Costa Tropical, Granada, Andalucia)