Cyclists pedaling along the treacherous stretch of the Ciclopista running through La Floresta have enjoyed safer travel during the Easter holiday period thanks to eight large metal drums strategically placed to keep speeding motorists from invading the unprotected trail.  Half of the green trash barrels were covered with large warning signs labeled with the legend “por el respeto al ciclista.” The biker safety initiative was implemented by La Floresta homeowner association President Fernando Plata Salaman, under approval by the local traffic office. While the temporary barriers will be removed next Monday, the possibility of putting them up on future weekends is now under consideration. 

Chapala was one of 16 Jalisco municipalities cited for debts on the listing of delinquent taxpayers released this month by the El Servicio de Adminstracion (SAT).

Lakeside’s large expat retiree population should be pleased to hear that construction of a first-rate hospital in the area finally appears to be on the horizon. 

Longtime expat resident John Plummer was pronounced dead at the scene on Tuesday, March 17 after taking a fatal tumble on the sidewalk near the entrance of the Super Lake grocery store in San Antonio Tlayacapan. 

Emergency first response medics from the Chapala Red Cross were unable to revive Plummer, who suffered a fatal head wound in the fall.  His body was retrieved by staff from a local funeral parlor after police reviewed video surveillance images showing that death was a result of an accident.

The local press was kept on the run over the past week, following in the steps of Chapala Mayor Joaquín Huerta and city hall staff in a frantic agenda of ribbon-cutting events held to inaugurate recently completed government projects.  Public officials in Jalisco and other states where elections will be held this year are banned from divulging propaganda on their accomplishments during the “closed season,” in effect from April 5 until after the polls close on June 7.  Below is a glance at some highlights on the barnstorming adventure.

MARCH 19: Daniel Gutierrez Ramirez, project manager at Semadet (Jalisco’s Environment Ministry), councilwoman Maria Eugenia Real Serrano and Mayor Huerta plant seeds in the new greenhouse installed at Chapala’s municipal nursery. The 160-square meter facility will serve as a center for cultivating endangered native tree species to reforest the Cerro Viejo-Chupinaya-Los Sabinos protected natural area. Semadet shelled out 250,000 pesos to build and equip the greenhouse, while the municipality covered 15,000 pesos of the bill.

MARCH 23: Officials spent a full day making the rounds to cut ribbons on the pre-fabriacted Bibliotecas Virtuales constructed in Ajijic, San Antonio Tlayacapan, Santa Cruz de la Soledad and San Nicolas de Ibarra. The 23-million-peso project funded by the National Council of Science and Technology includes two Chapala branches installed in existing government buildings. Youngsters from San Antonio got a kick out their introduction to the 20 computer terminals that are linked into Mexico’s digital library network.  The local online libraries will open to the public after the Easter holidays. Registered users will have passwords to access the system from their home computers.

MARCH 24: Next up was the debut of the glitzy Centro Comunitario built at the entrance of the public sports unit in Chapala’s downtrodden Plaza de Toros barrio. The 288-square-meter structure comprises four classrooms, a small administrative office and bathrooms for family counseling services and training courses in different self-employment trades, with room to grow on an upper story. The project, initiated last December, cost 2,296,756 pesos, with 322,000 coming from municipal coffers and the remainder covered by federal and state programs. Operations will begin in a few months once money comes in for furnishings.  

MARCH 25:  The mayor and his entourage showed off an extreme makeover at the Municipal Clinic. The improvements included the acquisition of top-to-bottom furnishings for patients, medical staff and administrative personnel and specialized equipment, such as a defibrillator, EKG machine, king-size instrument sterilizer and an incubator for newborns, along with uniforms for doctors and assorted supplies. The upgrade was subsidized through the the federal government’s Ramo 33 program for public health services.

In a bid to beat the clock on restrictions set under electoral laws, Chapala Mayor Joaquín Huerta is stepping up the pace of public appearances to inaugurate completed community improvement projects before the end of this month.