In Las Palmas, the management of the Urban Planning department, which is run by people from Las Palmas, is making headlines. The Urban Planning department of San Bartolomé de Tirajana, a key component of the economic engine of southern Gran Canaria, is facing an internal governance crisis following allegations of serious administrative and financial irregularities. A document filed with the town hall on April 22, 2026, alerts authorities to structural absenteeism by the head of Urban Planning Enforcement, Juan Bordes. The document states that the official has been continuously absent from his post since September 2024, without any justified reason or formal authorization. The document does not specify whether this remote work occurred while Bordes was in Spain.
The complaint, filed by Juan Manuel Pérez, alleges that the head of the department has not been present at the town hall for the past year and a half, a period during which the complainant claims to have visited the municipal offices between 15 and 20 times without finding him. This situation calls into question the effectiveness of a sensitive department, headed by Davinia Ramírez, where the management of urban planning files is reportedly compromised. The document warns that the supposed teleworking arrangement does not exempt the manager from physical presence or performance monitoring, elements that appear to have been lost in this department.
The financial aspect of the complaint casts suspicion on the use of public funds in the southern municipality. Despite his prolonged absence, the official allegedly received his full salary, including a productivity bonus estimated at €7.000 per quarter. The total financial loss to the municipal coffers is estimated at between €70.000 and €100.000 since September 2024, including salaries and bonuses linked to a performance that the complainant describes as nonexistent. The scandal extends to possible conflicts of interest in public service. There are suspicions that the head of Urban Planning Enforcement is combining his position with private practice as a lawyer without the required authorization, which would constitute a very serious offense. Given these indications, the mayor has been asked to immediately open an internal investigation and review attendance records and payrolls to determine responsibility before the Court of Auditors and the Public Prosecutor's Office.
The controversy centers on the productivity bonus, a concept that has gone from being a suspected case of improper payment to a weapon of alleged institutional retaliation. In a criminal complaint filed by Juan Bordes himself against the Councilor for Urban Planning, Davinia Ramírez, the civil servant alleges that he was the target of a web of irregularities and workplace harassment. Bordes maintains that, after refusing to carry out allegedly illegal orders, he suffered professional isolation and was the only technician in the department excluded from receiving the productivity bonus, a measure he describes as direct retaliation.
Resolving this payment freeze would have required the direct intervention of the mayor, Marco Aurelio Pérez, whom the official denies any involvement in the alleged irregularities. According to Bordes, it was the mayor's mediation that halted the harassment and unblocked the payment of his productivity bonuses, a claim that contradicts the external complaint questioning the legality of these payments given the employee's lack of on-site activity. While the absenteeism complaint suggests a lack of oversight by Human Resources and the Comptroller's Office, the official's lawsuit describes manipulation of files and internal pressure, which has already been submitted to the Court of Instruction Number 4 of San Bartolomé de Tirajana. The judge has agreed to initiate proceedings to clarify whether the use of these salary supplements and the management of urban planning regulations in the island's main tourist municipality are part of a legitimate administrative procedure or a scheme of conflicting interests.
