Last week, we gave a detailed overview of how the summer festivals in Torrevieja have a real impact on the people of the town, although not in the same way that the town hall publicises, and this week we have once again been treated to a lesson in maths, which doesn´t add up.
In the initial propaganda from the town hall, it was quoted that they had commissioned a report that suggests the economic impact of the summer festivals in Torrevieja are worth 12 million euro to the local economy, coincidentally, the same amount as in Murcia, where attendance was much higher. We also reflected on how the same town hall revised their figures last year, considerably downward, when the events had actually taken place.
In the initial report, one of the big bonuses this year was the introduction of the Reggaeton Beach Festival (RBF), which would attract 40,000 people to the Parque Antonio Soria. To put that in context, almost half of the entire regular population of Torrevieja squeezing into a tiny plot where the Friday market is normally held, except this week when the traders were prevented from earning as the Friday market had to close to make way for RBF.
In the days prior to the festival, there were many reports in various media platforms on how the organisers have sold 36,000 tickets to the event, so it is no doubt going to be a “huge success” when the press releases are issued on Monday. But, Torrevieja town hall posted on their Instagram account that the market is closed due to RBF, as they expect 18,000 people to attend. As we can see, once again, the figures are simply not adding up.
Rather than being the flagship event that raises a positive profile, this year, RBF has been marred in controversy, with the organisers facing massive losses, and even bigger fines. The Madrid event was cancelled as they couldn’t satisfy minimum safety standards on such matters as evacuation protocols. You might recall the Medusa festival in Valencia last year when a person died and at least 40 were injured, with the investigation still to be concluded. Of course, if you can’t actually quantify how many people will attend, then safety standards are potentially difficult to plan for too.
RBF were in trouble for not issuing refunds for the Madrid event, prompting the Ministry of Consumer Affairs to take action to point out the law on refunds, as many of those affected were benefitting from a government bonus scheme.
Furthermore, the same Ministry has now opened sanctions against the organisers for abusive practices, such as restricting food entry, preventing people from leaving without paying an additional fee, operating a cash-less function in the event, and withholding a fee when refunding cash-less bracelets, amongst other things. The expected fine could be around a million euro, or more.
In Torrevieja however, the organisers have benefitted from half a million euro of public money spent on publicity on behalf of the organisers, so at least they have saved that amount to put towards their fine, the money being given to a Barcelona company, rather than one of the local publicity firms. And of course, there is the overall costs such as policing, and cleaning up, among other things.
So, the truth is rather than RBF being a golden goose for Torrevieja, it is more of a white elephant, but no doubt somebody, somewhere will be benefitting, just not the people of Torrevieja.
