THE WEATHER
See page 2 for the week´s forecast
Edition 339
www.thecourier.es
Friday 15th September 2017
DEADLOCK BROKEN
T
here’s fresh hope that progress is set to be made over the stalled plans to upgrade the N-332 highway to a dual carriageway in the Torrevieja area, with the news that the Public Works Ministry in Madrid has agreed to assume the drafting of the project. The proposals had
become mired in a “who does what” dispute between the Madrid government and the regional Valencian administration over who takes responsibility, with a war of words breaking out between the two bodies earlier this year as they said that the plans for the project and environmental modifications are each others
responsibility, with Torrevieja council caught in the middle. Torrevieja’s mayor, José Manuel Dolón, showed the letter on Tuesday from the Public Works Ministry assuming responsibility for the N-332 project drafting, with Dolón firing a broadside at the Partido Popular (PP) saying that two years had been wasted because they had insisted that the responsibility for the drafting lay in the hands of the Valencian government. In turn, the PP’s Eduardo Dolón, the ex-Torrevieja mayor and now vice-president of the Alicante Provincial Council said that he, Valencian regional PP leader Isabel Bonig, and the PP parliamentarian from Torrevieja, Joaquín
Albaladejo met with Public Works Minister Íñigo de la Serna at the end of July, and did a deal which in effect “saved the project”. Eduardo Dolón said that he kept quiet about the news at the time, because it was only right for the due process to be followed with the Ministry making a formal communication to Torrevieja council. The next stage in the complicated process involves environmental impact studies and what land needs to be acquired ahead of any construction work, all of which could still take a considerable period of time, as the traffic jams continues between Torrevieja and the Orihuela Costa.
SORT OUT THE PARKS!
O
rihuela’s town hall has been slapped down by the Valencian Ombudsman over the dangerous state of playgrounds and green spaces on the Orihuela Costa, with the authority being asked by the official to do something about it immediately, though he has no legal power to ensure this happens. In April, The Courier reported that Tomás Moreno of the Federación de Asociaciones de Vecinos de Orihuela Costa (FAOC) used the word “suicidal” to sum up the state of the facilities, and he called on Orihuela council to implement an unanimously approved motion from 18
months earlier which called for play areas to be properly maintained. Now the Valencian Ombudsman, José Cholbi has stepped in, after reading media reports earlier in the year about the dangers caused by the ill-maintained facilities, and he asked for a report from Orihuela council asking how much it would cost to put things right. The council admitted that maintenance had fallen short, but they did not have enough money for repairs, though they told Cholbi that the required expenditure was around 300 thousand euro, with 200 thousand euro to be spent for work on
play areas on the beaches. The council did not tell the Ombudsman when the planned to undertake the work. Cholbi has told the council that the dangers posed to users of the facilities were such that work needed to be done urgently, and that they would be failing in their
duties to carry out the work. The Valencian Ombudsman is elected by members of the Valencian parliament every five years, but is completely independent. His job is to ensure that the rights and freedoms of residents are observed by councils and public bodies across the Valencia region.