The judgement rejects the appeal lodged by the regional government over the operation surrounding the Sa Muleta II development in Soller.
The TSJIB (Balearic high court) imposed the compensation on the understanding that an agreement reached by the government with the company in 2013, during the administration of the former president José Ramón Bauzà, had been breached.
Together with the compensation for Punta Pedrera in Ibiza, 86 million euros, and that of Cesgarden in Menorca, 28.8 million, it is one of the highest ever imposed in the Balearics’ urban planning history.
The conflict with Muleta II dates back nearly 14 years.
On the land in Soller, the German developer intended to build a luxury residential development.
However, the land was declassified by the administration in 2008 and converted into rustic land, which led to the initiation of the contentious procedure.
In 2013, the government and the company reached an agreement that closed this part of the legal process.
Another legislative change once again allowed building in the area and, therefore, the lawsuit had lost its purpose.
However, there was a new chapter: Soller Council refused to allow building again and did not carry out a change in the planning law.
That decision was again appealed and the town council was upheld in court on the grounds of its autonomy in urban planning matters.
In yet another twist, another change in the regional administration led in 2016 to the government suspending the regulations that would have allowed it to be reclassified as urban land, and in 2017 the land reverted to rustic land.
As the property did not return to urban land, the agreement that had been reached between the government and Kühn in 2013 was not fulfilled.
Birdie Son Vida initiated a new legal procedure due to the impossibility of executing a judicial resolution and the TSJIB ruled in 2022 that it was therefore appropriate to pay compensation for the impossibility of developing the work.
The Supreme Court has upheld this position and rejected the need to open a new procedure from scratch, as claimed by the Lawyers’ Office of the Balearics.
Thus, according to the ruling, the Balearic government has a period of two months to pay 63.5 million euros as the main claim plus another thirty million euros in interest since the lawsuit was filed.
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Never trust a man who cheats at golf.
100 Million Euros !!!! How Mallorca could do with spending that huge amount of money on Island projects.
You beat me to it Peter. I have never ceased to be surprised at the idiotic way various departments of council, local government and national government deal or do not deal with each other. Developing Dragonera, Cabrera National Park, The Soller Tunnel, Magaluf Marina, A rail/tramway to the airport , Relocation of the Cruise ship Docking zone, Es Capellans Playa de Muro, etc etc etc. Some of those have ended successfully, others less so or are ongoing. But the common factor is one side seems incapable or unwilling to deal with the other. Some will say twas ever thus. That is certainly true of the Baleares, much as I love it.
Another typical balls up by an inept Balearic government.