Frontera NorteSur
September-October 2003

October 27, 2003
Tijuana Choked with Smoke from San Diego-Area Fires

Baja California health officials have told Tijuana residents to wear face masks for protection from the smoke and ash created by fires in the San Diego area. Gabriel Gómez Ruiz, head of the State Office of Civil Protection (Dirección Estatal de Protección Civil, DEPC), stated that everyone should wear the masks if possible. 

Although black smoke from the fires hangs over Tijuana and ash is settling throughout the city, state officials have emphasized that schools and businesses are not closed. However, the parents of children with past histories of asthma are warned to keep their children indoors and to keep them home from school, said Juan José Ramos Aguilera, an official with the state educational system. Also, physical education teachers have been told not to take students outside until conditions improve. 

Gómez, the head of the State Office of Civil Protection, told Tijuana residents to sweep up any ash outside their homes and to dispose of it in closed bags. Gómez is concerned that the Santa Ana winds will lift the ash back into the air. 

Tijuana's Frontera newspaper wrote that the smoke over the city on Sunday, October 26 was so thick that the sun appeared as a red disk that one could look at with bare eyes. 

Source: Frontera (Tijuana), October 27, 2003.

October October 6, 2003
Study Shows Tijuana is Pessimistic in Outlook, Mexicali Optimistic

In comparison to people in 20 major Mexican cities, the residents of Tijuana are among the most pessimistic in outlook, according to a consumer confidence survey commissioned by the States' Editors Association (Associación de Editores de los Estados) and Prensa Healy, the publisher of Tijuana's Frontera newspaper and Mexicali's La Crónica . The study concluded that only Torreón, Coahuila outranked Tijuana in pessimism.

Residents of 20 Mexican cities were interviewed on ten different subjects including various aspects of their personal economic lives and their view of Mexican economic issues. Study results were given in percentages with a score above 50% denoting optimism and below meaning pessimism. 

Tijuana residents were most pessimistic about the rate of inflation (34.7%), interest rates (38.2%), and the peso-dollar exchange rate (40.7%). Residents were most positive in their thoughts about quality of life (58.0%), position at work (57.0%) and income (55.5%). The city's average score was 42.3%.

Ciudad Victoria, Tamaulipas, the most optimistic city included in the survey, had an average score of 57.9%. In terms of quality of life it scored 69.5%, income 69.5% and position at work 69.0%. 

Ciudad Victoria was followed in the survey by La Paz, Baja California Sur with an average score of 52.8% and Hermosillo, Sonora at 52.6%. 

Mexicali finished at number five in terms of optimism with the following scores: quality of life 62.5%, position at work 58.0% and income 57.5%. The national averages for these areas were 58.0% for quality of life, 57.0% for position at work and 54.9% for income. 

Source: Frontera (Tijuana), October 6, 2003. Article by Vicente Gallardo.
La Crónica (Mexicali), October 6, 2003. Article by Jesús Lemus. 

September 30, 2003
Tijuana Fights Illegal Waste Dumps

In an effort to beautify Tijuana and reduce health risks, city government has embarked on a process to cleanup illegal garbage dumps and end their use. 

To aid in the cleanup of unregulated waste sites, the city has decentralized solid waste management and acquired new equipment. On Mondays through Fridays, sanitation workers run regular, garbage-pickup routes throughout the city. On Saturdays, workers dedicate themselves to removing waste from Tijuana's illegal dumps. 

To end residents' practice of throwing garbage in empty areas, the city has increased fines against polluters. It has also been running a media campaign known as "Vamos a Limpiar Tijuana" (Let's Cleanup Tijuana). 

Martín Dávila Echeverría, director of the Department of Sanitation and City Maintenance, says that illegal dumps come in many sizes. Some are small, taking up no more than a street corner. Others are larger, like the sides of hills or empty fields. The worst dumps are large canyons that are being filled with waste. 

Despite the city's efforts, the number of known illegal dump sites have increased over the past fourteen months. In July 2002, Dávila's department found 120 unregulated waste disposal areas throughout the city. By September 2003, this number had increased to 131. 

Dávila states that the problem of illegal waste disposal is hard to combat because for years residents have been in the habit of improperly disposing of garbage. This has created what he refers to as a vicious cycle in which the city cleans a field and then residents refill it with waste. 

Source: Frontera (Tijuana), September 30, 2003. Article by Manuel de Jesús Villegas. 

September 10, 2003
Thousands of Stolen Vehicles Destroyed in Tijuana Cleanup Effort, Owners Not Notified

Between 2002 and the present, Tijuana has removed approximately 25,000 stripped vehicles from city streets and sent them to their ultimate fate of compaction at junk yards. Of these vehicles, an estimated 7% to 30% were stolen but until June 2003 the vehicles' owners were never notified that their property was headed for destruction. 

Luis Alfonso Morlett Corrales is an official with the Tijuana city government. When asked if stolen vehicles were among those compacted he replied, "I suppose, but we can't talk about them being stolen because they are not even cars anymore, they have no parts, no one is allowed to take away complete cars even if they lack tires, the cars have to be totally destroyed, burned, stripped, with no windows, in a state of total abandonment."

Rogelio Delgado Neri, an assistant state attorney in Tijuana, told that city's Frontera newspaper (no relation to FNS) that before June of this year a few thousand stolen cars were destroyed without first notifying the vehicles' owners. 

Prior to June, according to Morlett, there was a case in which a stolen car was inadvertently crushed. The owner showed up looking for his vehicle and said that he wanted it returned to him. A scandal ensued and on June 12, 2003, Tijuana began making sure that all vehicles marked for destruction were inspected by the state police's auto theft unit. In the case that a junked vehicle is stolen, the state police contact the owner and describe its condition. If the owner is no longer interested in the vehicle, it is destroyed. Otherwise, the owner can recover the car. 

Delgado says that between one and three of every ten junked vehicles is a stolen vehicle. However, this estimate seems high. Recent statistics reported by Frontera note that out of every 700 junked cars, an average of between 50 and 60 were stolen (7% and 8.5%). 

Despite the program's early problems, city officials and state law enforcement view the removals as a success. Police like the program because it allows them to close stolen vehicle cases. City officials are glad to get rid of health and traffic hazards and beautify their city by removing junk from city streets.

Source: Frontera (Tijuana), September 9, 2003. Articles by Manuel Villegas.