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Date Published: 17/01/2022
ARCHIVED - Contract for cleaning Cartagena beaches put on hold indefinitely
A tender to look after cleaning the Mar Menor beaches for the next 3 years has been suspended following questions of its legality
The build-up of algae, seaweed and other natural materials on beaches in the Mar Menor area needs to be cleared away and disposed of because otherwise it becomes an eyesore on the coast, makes the beaches unusable for the public and creates an environmental hazard, but a contract slated to be awarded to a company to do just that has been shelved pending legal review.
Last November, the Mayor of Cartagena, Noelia Arroyo, warned of the extremely urgent need to have a large municipal contract for the cleaning of biomass from the Mar Menor beaches for the whole year. “It is not only the cleanliness, the image of seeing the beaches like this or the health problems it can cause to users… this issue should be part of the protection strategies of the Mar Menor,” she said back then.
A month later, the same contract was put out to tender: three years, plus two extensions, with an initial amount of 2.7 million euros. As of today, though, this lucrative contract, so much in demand by the administrations, has been put on hold after the Association of Public Cleaning Companies (ASELIP) lodged an appeal with the Central Administrative Tribunal of Contractual Resources (TARC), in which it alleges that “the criteria for automatic evaluation and award of tenders do not comply with the law, in that they do not establish a fixed or minimum number of units to be used for the provision of the service” and, therefore, that it should be cancelled.
Pending the ruling of the TARC, the large biomass removal contract could be back to square one if the body decides to annul the tendering process, which would considerably delay the deadlines for awarding the contract.
In the meantime, the municipal administration has some time to maintain this service without the beaches suffering. Municipal sources explain that they currently have a team of personnel contracted by the SEF to carry out this work, in addition to the CARM brigades. In addition, from this month the company based in Espinardo STV Gestión will be responsible until next June for the removal of biomass accumulated on the beaches of the southern part of the Mar Menor after being awarded a contract worth 200,000 euros.
However, just last week the companies in charge of removing this biomass using light machinery came under fire from the ecogroup Mar Menor KO for incompetence and actually making the environmental situation worse because the work wasn’t being overseen by a trained and certified biologist.
Image: Archive
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