The inmates’ pavilion of the old San Antón prison will remain standing and will be open to citizens. This was announced this Monday by the mayoress of Cartagena, Noelia Arroyo, and the president of the Isen training centers, Carlos Andreu. Both met to talk about the growth plans of the university center and the joint decision they will take to define the uses of the old prison, which “will be respectful of the original building and the environment,” according to the City Council after the meeting.
The mayoress considers it “great news” for the San Antón neighborhood that Isen has decided to maintain and rehabilitate said historic building, expand its training offer in it and, in addition, give it a citizen use.
The model to follow will be the old Bazán Apprentice School, on Menéndez Pelayo street, next to the Police station, acquired and rehabilitated in 2015 by Isen to locate its university degrees. The City Council will collaborate with this local company to find the best formula for the old prison. According to the mayoress, “the daily presence of students in these facilities will be good for San Antón.”
At the end of April, LA VERDAD reported that Isen acquired the former San Antón prison from the Perpertuo Socorro Hospital for just over a million euros, closed in 2002 as a penal establishment and well inventoried by the General Directorate of Cultural Assets of the Community Autonomous since April 2018. The purchase -confirmed this Monday by Andreu- became official a week after it became known that the Cartagena City Council had lost the battle with the Perpetual Help Society in the lawsuit over the buildings that must be protected in the old jail In a ruling last March, the Superior Court of Justice (TSJ) of the Region of Murcia dismissed the municipal appeal filed two years ago against the decision of the regional Administration to exclude the inmates’ pavilion from the protected elements of the compound, which are its entrance building and the surveillance booths. First Perpetual Help and now Isen thus have a free way to bring it down. However, the new ownership opts to keep standing and rehabilitate the central building of the old prison complex despite the fact that several parts threaten ruin.
Carlos Andreu assured that the rehabilitation of the building could involve an investment of more than 6 million euros. He said he is convinced that the Isen project will be beneficial for San Antón: “It will serve to revitalize the neighborhood in addition to recovering an emblematic building for the people of Cartagena.”
three thousand new students
Isen is a higher education center attached to the University of Murcia, through which seven thousand university students and fifteen thousand professional training have passed. According to Carlos Andreu’s estimates, some three thousand more students could study in these new facilities, which would expand the vocational training offer with degrees in the socio-sanitary branch, new technologies and archaeology, a newly created degree that they want to implement in Cartagena.
“Their presence is especially interesting at this time when we want to align all teaching capacity to take advantage of the opportunities of new industries and the Defense industry,” according to Arroyo. The mayoress recalled that Isen already teaches a double degree in Security and Criminology, as well as a higher course in Security and Strategic Intelligence. “This training line coincides with the objectives of making Cartagena a European center for the defense industries and add its offer to those already taught from the UPCT,” she concluded.
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