The Valencian Regional Government has included a multi-year budget allocation in the regional accounts for the expansion of the Torrevieja Courthouse for the third consecutive year. After three years of considering this investment, the Ministry of Justice still lacks a preliminary design for the facilities. The project was first announced by the Mayor of Torrevieja, Eduardo Dolón, when the first budgets of the current regional government were approved at the end of 2023 for the 2024 fiscal year. That initial allocation was undoubtedly the most ambitious, with the City Council providing an area of land measuring approximately 800 square metres located between the Courthouse and the multi-purpose municipal building, formerly the new Holy Week Museum, on Las Habaneras Avenue.
In that initial budget, it was confirmed that the renovation and expansion of the Torrevieja courthouse would be allocated almost five million euro (€4,947,000). This multi-year allocation included €49,000 in 2024, initially earmarked for awarding the contract for the drafting of the project; €425,000 in 2025; and €4,472,000 for the execution of the works planned for 2026, with a three-year timeframe. Three years later, however, the official documentation of the Ministry of Justice does not show that a preliminary project for the works has been awarded.
Following the devastating floods of October 2024, the regional government had to drastically reduce its ambitious initial expansion plan for 2025, leaving the budget at just over €700,000 spread over four years, which represents a cut of more than 85%. This year, 2026, for the budget yet to be approved, the regional government has done exactly the same, putting forward the same budget of €736,000. This includes €100,000 for developing the project and the remainder for carrying out the work.
With that budget, if the goal is truly to expand the courthouse, the regional ministry will have to design a very discreet infrastructure on the available plot of land. By comparison, the first expansion of the Palace of Justice carried out in the mid-2000s, which was financed by a real estate developer, cost 3.5 million euro.
Sources from the municipal government team indicated that the project promoted by the then regional minister Salomé Pradas experienced a period of paralysis after her resignation following the DANA storm of 2024. Currently, the regional administration has resumed consultations with the City Council regarding the land it ceded for the project.
The municipal plot is used, along with a small plot belonging to the Generalitat, for the free parking of some 40 official vehicles assigned mainly to the adjacent Guardia Civil barracks, and to a lesser extent, to the justice officials, with a video surveillance system linked to the Palace of Justice. The land that the Torrevieja City Council is proposing to the Generalitat had a very significant previous use as a National Police station. In May 2024, the City Council decided to reclaim it, having ceded the land to the Ministry of the Interior two decades earlier for the construction of the proposed police facilities.
Over the past three years, the Generalitat has undertaken several investments related to the administration of justice in Torrevieja. These include the rental and renovation of premises to establish a Comprehensive Forensic Assessment Unit (UVFI) and a judicial document archive for the Torrevieja judicial district, representing an investment of over €300,000, not including the rental of the premises, located next to the Guardia Civil barracks on Patricio Zammit Street. There has also been a proposal to relocate one of the judicial archives still housed in the Palace of Justice to a basement in the municipal multipurpose building.
The Torrevieja Judicial District, the 13th in the Valencian Community, was created in April 1999 and began operating in temporary facilities in June of that year. In 2000, the Palace of Justice opened with a floor area of approximately 3,400 square metres, which was expanded by another 3,000 square metres in 2007. This latter expansion was financed and built by a real estate developer in exchange for obtaining a municipal plot of land zoned for residential use. The Valencian Government and the judges endorsed the real estate transaction promoted by the City Council without question. The expansion, however, soon proved too small.
Following the latest judicial reform, the Torrevieja Courthouse has a Court of First Instance with four judicial positions in the Instruction Section and five in the Civil Section, in addition to two Criminal Courts, which are still formally attached to the judicial district of Orihuela. The responsibility for appointing judges, prosecutors, court clerks, and administrative officers lies with the Ministry of Justice, while the provision of material resources is the responsibility of the Generalitat. The Torrevieja Courthouse employs over 120 civil servants and is a public venue visited daily by hundreds of citizens from Torrevieja and its judicial district.
