2006 CPEO Installation Reuse Forum Archive

From: Lenny Siegel <lsiegel@cpeo.org>
Date: 7 Aug 2006 04:45:58 -0000
Reply: cpeo-irf
Subject: [CPEO-IRF] "Aníbal abandoned Vieques..."
 
The following article from the July 28, 2006 edition of
El Nuevo Día was translated and circulated by R. Rabin/Comité Pro Rescate y Desarrollo de Vieques



Aníbal abandoned Vieques...


José E. Rivera Santana
Ex-director of the Master Plan for Sustainable Development for Vieques and Culebra


Probably ill advised, the Governor of Puerto Rico will become the First Executive who lost the opportunity to do for Vieques (and for Culebra as well) what no other governor had done. Everything was in his favor: laws, plans and structures created especially for its implementation.

Unexplainably, Acevedo Vilá closes the Office of Commissioner for Vieques and Culebra. With that he tossed overboard the consensus achieved among political parties, the communities of both islands and representative sectors of civilian society, embodied in the recommendations of the Special Commission on Vieques named by then governor, Pedro Roselló.

That commission recognized the importance of creating the office as a necesarry instrument to deal with the documented inefficiency of public agencies at the central level. Later on, ex governor, Sila M. Calderón, widened the scope of the project to include the island municipality of Culebra.

In 2002 Law 153 is approved, declaring Vieques and Culebra "Special Development Zones" and ordering the preparation of a Development Plan. That plan, known as the Master Plan for Sustainable Development of Vieques and Culebra, was commissioned, prepared and approved in December of 2004.

The implementation of the Master Plan remained in the hands of the Interagency Group created by Law 153 and made up of several agencies under the direction of the Department of Economic and Commercial Development (DECD). From its creation until December 2004, the Interagency Group was directed by the Secretary of DECD, then Milton Segarra and by the commissioner of Vieques and Culebra, Dr. Juan Fernández.

With the election of Aníbal Acevedo Vilá, the two island municipalities lost their priority status. As we mentioned, the Commissioner’s Office was closed and direction of the Interagency Group was given to lower echelon functionaries. In effect, from January 2005 to now, this group has had three different directors. Meanwhile, the Viequenses and Culebrenses perceive, correctly, that Aníbal has abandoned them.


--



Lenny Siegel Director, Center for Public Environmental Oversight c/o PSC, 278-A Hope St., Mountain View, CA 94041 Voice: 650/961-8918 or 650/969-1545 Fax: 650/961-8918 <lsiegel@cpeo.org> http://www.cpeo.org


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