The Town Hall staff in Motril received half of their outstanding salaries after the Mayor negotiated a bank loan for 700,000 euros.
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| Town Hall - Motril |
Salaries for Town Hall employees – around a thousand workers – had been outstanding since September.
Staff have been staging daily protests since the beginning of this month.
The loan is an advance on the town's future earnings, both from municipal taxes as well as funds received from the State.
The Councillor for the Economy, who is also the Vice-Mayor and the Chairman of the area council for the Costa Tropical, was keen to point out that it had not been a loan, but simply an advance.
This Tuesday, 16th, before the loan was announced, the Mayor had given the order to pay 50% of the outstanding salaries from the existing funds in the municipal coffers.
Had the Town Hall known that the money from the bank would have been available so soon, then they would have held off depleting the coffers.
The Town Hall says in its defence that it would not have had any problems with the salaries had the Junta de Andalucia paid over nearly a million in funds for social services.
The Town Council had forwarded the funds to the social entities from the municipal accounts, believing that the Junta was on the point of paying over the agreed funds. Apparently this debt goes back to 2010.
Editorial Comment: When is a loan not a loan, indeed?
Many readers might consider that if somebody gives you money on the condition that you give it back, with interest, it is a loan.
Coastal Gazette News: Motril, Costa Tropical, Granada, Andalucia
