How much does a mayor in Malaga province earn? From 90,000 euros down to nothing

Cristina Vallejo, Antonio M. Romero y Encarni Hinojosa

Málaga

Friday, 14 February 2025, 15:42

Francisco de la Torre, mayor of Malaga city, is the highest-paid council leader in the province with a gross salary of 90,815.23 euros. He is also the eighth highest-paid mayor in all Spain, behind council leaders in Madrid (108,517 euros), Barcelona, Bilbao, San Sebastián, Vitoria, Valencia and Seville (92,440 euros). These are the latest figures available, corresponding to the year 2023, that all municipal councils have to communicate to central government and which are then made publicly available.

The remuneration of mayors as well as other public officials, whether elected or not, is regulated by the national budget, which sets the maximum amounts depending on the population of the municipality in question. Those for the year in question - 2023 - set out the salary levels for all members of local corporations, including the regulations that apply to mayors, who can be paid between 46,917.33 euros (for towns with between 1,000 and 5,000 inhabitants) and up to 117,293.32 euros for cities with over 500,000 inhabitants. These are figures for people exclusively dedicated to these roles. This latter salary level means that Malaga's mayor could be paid more, although no Spanish council leader reaches this salary ceiling.

Malaga's Paco de la Torre is the eighth highest-paid mayor in Spain and yet governs the sixth most populous municipality. The total of over 587,000 inhabitants of the Costa del Sol capital in 2023 were only beaten by Madrid, Barcelona, Valencia, Seville and Zaragoza. Mayors in three Basque cities - Bilbao, San Sebastián and Victoria - earn more than the mayor of Malaga with smaller populations.

After Malaga, the Spanish council that pays its mayor the most is Getxo (89,599 euros), a town in Vizcaya with 76,155 inhabitants, followed by Almeria (88,884 euros), which in 2023 was the 30th most populated city in Spain with around 200,000 inhabitants. This completes the 'top ten' of the highest-paid mayors in the country.

What is the picture across other municipalities in Malaga province? After Malaga city itself, the municipality that pays its mayor most is Fuengirola: Ana Mula, of the Partido Popular, earned 78,110 euros in 2023, working exclusively as the town's mayor.

In the national ranking of municipalities that pay their mayors the most, Fuengirola comes 33rd behind Ermua (78,118 euros) and immediately ahead of Móstoles (78,096 euros). Ermua had just over 15,600 inhabitants in 2023, while Fuengirola had over 85,600 inhabitants and Móstoles had more than 213,000. A very similar salary for mayors of municipalities that vary greatly in size.

In third position in the provincial ranking is Vélez-Málaga, the fourth most-populated town in the province. Yet this is the point where another caveat must be introduced to understand the data properly: 2023 was an election year with regional and municipal elections being held at the end of May, so the figures provided by the government correspond on the one hand to the first part of the year and on the other to the remaining months, regardless of whether the mayor remained in post.

In the Malaga cases that have been referred to so far, the mayor was re-elected, but this is not the case in Vélez, as Jesús Lupiáñez (PP) replaced the Socialist Antonio Moreno Ferrer after the result of the local elections held on 28 May 2023. So the first 32,492.73 euros would correspond to the outgoing mayor in that year and the 37,739.69 euros to the incoming one.

The total remuneration paid by the town council of Vélez-Málaga to its mayor, a municipality of 86,364 inhabitants in 2023, is very similar to that of Spanish provincial capitals such as Santander (172,655 inhabitants) and Granada (232,246 inhabitants).

Next in the provincial ranking is Antequera: Manuel Baró of the PP was paid 62,609.77 euros in 2023. Next come Torrox and Benalmádena, with salaries for their respective mayors of just over 58,000 euros in 2023. The former had a population of 20,831 inhabitants in that year and the latter had over 76,000. Moreover, this is not the only area in which they differ: in the 2023 elections in Torrox the PP's Óscar Medina won again.

However, in Benalmádena Juan Antonio Lara (PP) was elected so, with his predecessor, the socialist Víctor Navas, they each took part of that overall salary pro rata, at a rate of 27,461 euros for Navas paid until May and another 30,594 euros for Lara who won the election and was paid that amount for the remaining seven months that year.

Ronda is also very close to these figures: its PP mayor, María de la Paz Fernández, was paid 57,418 euros. Cártama too, where the socialist mayor Jorge Gallardo received 56,450 euros

In the case of Álora: the government data shows that its mayor, Francisco Martínez, a Socialist in this case, received a total of 74,040.52 euros in 2023 also for working exclusively as the town's mayor. This amount, however is incorrect and the ministry has been notified of the error, according to the mayor. Álora town hall, in a document signed by its secretary general, has informed that the gross salary of the mayor in 2023 was 53,996.18 euros.

It is surprising that the salary of the mayor of Marbella is behind all these other places considering that it is the second largest municipality in the province in terms of population with over 156,000 inhabitants.

Ángeles Muñoz from the PP earned 54,585.10 euros. During the first half of 2023, the period corresponding to the previous term of office and prior to the elections, she received 12,000 euros as mayor as she was not working exclusively in that role. Following her re-election, she was paid 42,585 euros for the rest of the year. One can only presume that for 2024 she will have received double the latter figure, meaning a salary of close to 85,000 euros. Still, with only the 2023 data currently available, we can only say that it is a similar salary to that received by the mayors of Almassora (Castellón) and Alpedrete (Madrid), which had approximately just 28,000 and 15,500 inhabitants in 2023 respectively.

After Malaga city and Marbella, the third most populous town in the province is Mijas with more than 90,700 inhabitants. The gross salary of its PSOE mayor, Josele González was just over 41,450 euros in the last year for which data is available. In the pre-election months he received 26,721 euros working exclusively in his mayoral role and then only 14,730 euros in the latter months. This is because González was removed from office as mayor at the beginning of November 2023 when the vote of no confidence took place, giving the reins of power to the PP's Ana Mata.

With just over 77,000 residents Estepona was the sixth most populous town in Malaga in 2023. Its mayor, José María García Urbano, is listed in the records as receiving zero euros for his work as council leader, as he is listed as «non-dedicated». Since he became mayor of Estepona for the first time in 2011, García Urbano has not received any remuneration for fulfilling his duties in this role as he has declared his salary compatibility with his public function as mayor with his other public, paid work as a property registrar. He has also renounced being reimbursed to attend required town hall meetings, be they full council or committee meetings.

Another unusual case is that of Torremolinos (70,345 inhabitants in 2023). Its mayor, Margarita del Cid of the Partido Popular, earned almost 41,000 euros. In the first part of the year, before the May elections, she received 4,800 euros as 'non-dedicated' mayor and then, for the second part of the year, her return to office led to her being paid 36,179.41 euros as she took up her duties as her exclusive work.

In Rincón de la Victoria, with more than 50,000 inhabitants, Francisco Salado received a total of 40,200 euros at a rate of 20,100 euros per semester. This was as a non-dedicated mayor as he is also president of Malaga's provincial council (the Diputación). In June 2023 he was re-elected as the highest representative of the Diputación and his gross annual, exclusive salary is 90,000 euros per year. This is because the salaries in the Diputación are matched to those of the city council in the provincial capital, the latter being taken as the benchmark to establish the remuneration policy for the provincial governing body.

After this review of the mayoral salaries in the most populated municipalities in the province, what about those with fewer inhabitants? There are some oddities here - for example, that of Atajate which, in 2023, was the second smallest village in the province with barely 200 inhabitants. Its part-time mayor, Auxiliadora Sánchez for PSOE, was paid 56,532.19 euros.

Next, what about those who are paid the least? According to official figures, along with the mayor of Estepona, the mayor of Canillas de Albaida, Jorge Martín (PP), also received no salary. Note, however, that he was replaced by Encarnación Pareja - who does receive a salary - in October 2023 after becoming president of the Mancomunidad of the Eastern Costa del Sol-Axarquía.

Among those who are paid, but not much, are the mayors of Istán (330 euros) and Almogía (900 euros). The mayors of Casabermeja, Totalán, Iznate, Viñuela and Cortes de la Frontera receive more than 1,000 euros, but none of them receives more than 10,000 euros.

More concerning is the good number of municipalities in Malaga that do not comply with their duty to report the remuneration of their elected officials. They amount to one dozen, although three of them are lacking a signature on the reporting document - namely Benaoján, Casares and Pizarra.

For the other nine, the ministry has not received data: Alcaucín, Alfarnatejo, Alhaurín el Grande, Canillas de Aceituno, Cañete la Real, Coín, Moclinejo, Monda and Villanueva de la Concepción.

Across all Spain a total of 1,360 municipalities, 16.7% of the total (there are 8,132 localities in the country), have either not submitted the information, or the information has not been signed, or it includes doubtful or incomplete data and clarification has been requested.