Cancun, Q.R. — After numerous social media complaints regarding the recent construction at the new Gran Solaris Cancun hotel at Playa Delfines, Cancun mayor Mara Lezama Espinoza clarified that the land was sold and permits granted in 2017, before her administration.
She has explained that the special license granted by the Ecology Directorate for the Gran Solaris Cancún hotel near Playa Delfines was expressly requested by the municipal council, headed by previous mayor Remberto Estrada Barba.
In recent days, the hotel complex emerged with a newly constructed wall, which has caused social media uproar. Armando Lara De Nigris, head of the Ministry of Ecology and Urban Development of Benito Juárez said that the concrete fence surrounding the perimeter has been an ongoing project since the beginning of the year, but was not visible since it was constructed behind a metal barrier.
She says that according to the municipal Urban Development Program, the property has a coefficient land use of 140 hotel rooms per hectare, but at the express request of the previous city council, a license was granted that allows 240 rooms per hectare.
Mara Lezama Espinoza clarified that the project is endorsed by federal and municipal authorities, so the current administration cannot close it, and in addition to doing so, the municipal authority could be subject to a fine.
She explained that the Gran Solaris Cancún is a 450-room hotel complex next to Playa Delfines in the Cancun Hotel Zone and is a property that an individual bought in 2004 from Fonatur (el Fondo Nacional de Fomento al Turismo).
“I want it to be very clear. We did not sell the property. The property was sold in 2004. We did not give them a construction license, it was given by the administration in 2017. We did not approve the Environmental Impact Statement of the project because that is done by a federal institution, the Ministry of the Environment and Natural Resources, which is Semarnat,” she clarified.
Mara Lezama explained that on June 19, 2017, the construction license was issued and that the permit was contested before the Municipal Council by means of review. It was resolved on September 21, 2018, in which the nullity of that license was resolved and which the General Directorate of Urban Development issued a new construction license on September 27, 2018.
“It was not in this administration. We have not given permission. We have nothing to do with the executive government, the municipal government, nothing to do with the administrative trials that take place in other instances and with other powers,” she stressed.
