Public care homes for older people in Sagunto: council demands the Generalitat build them
Sagunto's council voted unanimously to ask the regional social services department for public care homes for older people, and to commission a study of how many places the city lacks.
The October plenary session of Sagunto City Council has unanimously approved a motion by Compromís per Sagunt (a Valencian left-wing coalition), presented by councillor Maria Josep Soriano, calling for more public care homes for older people. The agreement has three parts. First, it demands that the regional Conselleria of Social Services, Equality and Housing promote, fund and build these centres urgently. Second, it orders a technical study to quantify how many places are needed in the short and long term. Third, it asks for a study of a reserve of municipal land on which to build the homes that study justifies.
The starting point is a calculation. The motion says the World Health Organization recommends at least five residential places for every 100 people aged 65 or over. With around 68,000 inhabitants, about 20% of whom are over that age, Sagunto would need some 680 places. According to the same text, the supply in the town centre of Sagunto and in Puerto de Sagunto (the coastal district) is around 300-350 places, split between one public centre and several subsidised and private ones. That gives an estimated shortfall of between 330 and 380 places. These are the proposing group's figures, which is why the council asked for the technical study: until it exists, there is no municipal measurement of real demand.
The motion places the request within the 2030 Agenda and the Sustainable Development Goals, which include healthy ageing, the inclusion of older people and the fight against age discrimination. It argues that care homes are one of the infrastructures needed so that people can face the end of their lives with professional support, and it links the urgency to the ageing population and to the considerable increase in residents in recent years.
A comparison with the rest of the country helps to put that ratio in context. In a report from October 2023, the CSIC (Spain's national research council) counted 5,573 care homes with 393,581 places in Spain, equal to 4.2 places per 100 older people. So the national average sits below the ratio of five that the motion attributes to the WHO, which means Sagunto would not be an isolated exception, although the motion speaks of a shortfall specific to the city. The CSIC does not confirm that attribution to the WHO.
In Puerto de Sagunto, the only public centre for dependent older people is at Avenida de la Ribera 4. It is owned by the Generalitat Valenciana and run by a private company after a public tender. According to the Conselleria's information guide, which has no visible date and may therefore be out of date, it offers 100 residential places and 15 day-centre places.
The other public resource for older people now under way does not add care home places. It is the work on the former company store of Altos Hornos del Mediterráneo (the old steelworks), which will house a day centre for 50 people and the extension of the CEAM (senior citizens' centre) of Puerto de Sagunto. The Generalitat reported on 20 January 2026 that work began in December 2025, that it is expected to finish in 2027 and that the investment is 5.25 million euros. The Conselleria will provide the staff, the equipment and the maintenance.
That project has its own history of demands. In October 2023, according to Valencia Plaza, Mayor Darío Moreno asked the Conselleria to move quickly because of the demand for places in Puerto de Sagunto, and the answer was that budget was being reassigned so European funds could be used in time. In November of that year, according to the same outlet, the council unanimously asked for the tender to be speeded up, with a base budget of 5,250,000 euros. The Generalitat announced the tender on 17 October 2024 at 5,248,985 euros. According to elperiodic.com in August 2025, the works were awarded to Llop Proyectos Integrales SL for more than five million euros including VAT and an 18-month deadline, and the mayor expected them to start before the end of the year.
The regional framework also exists on paper. The Generalitat's Convivint plan for social services infrastructure, which covered 2021 to 2025, foresaw 100 actions for older people with 279 million euros of investment, although the official note does not say which of them were for Sagunto.
What comes next is the technical study. The municipal note gives no deadline for it, no indication of which land is being considered, and no word on whether the Conselleria has answered the demand. In the meantime, for a family in Sagunto or Puerto de Sagunto with a dependent older relative, the public offer remains the same: a 100-place care home in the Puerto and a day centre under construction that is expected to open in 2027. According to aytosagunto.es and elperiodic.com, with data from the Conselleria of Social Services, the Generalitat, the CSIC and Valencia Plaza.