By Juan Montoya
Despite the daily firefights between rival drug gangs, it being the home base for the Cartel del Golfo, the daily extortion of residents and businesses by the Mafia-like "Maña," and the de facto isolation from the rest of northern Tamaulipas, Matamoros a
la Brownsville is seeking recognition from the federal government as a "Municipio de Calidad."
la Brownsville is seeking recognition from the federal government as a "Municipio de Calidad."Like it's neighbor across the charco, Matamoros apparently believes that once designated as a Municipio de Calidad as Brownsville was "All-American City" will make its problems go away and coat it with a patina of glamor and and an aura such as the Emerald City of Oz.
Brownsville, after being granted the designation, remains a leader in unemployment, and the abysmal condition of its streets still remain a gold-mine for tire dealers, windshield shops, shock absorber salesmen, and automobile body repairmen and mechanics.
Its downtown is still populated with crack hustlers looking for a trick, down-and-out panhandlers looking for spare change, car washers hanging out in public parking lots, and parking meter goons ready with a citation for those who venture too long in its environs.
The result of our downtown policy has been a desertion of the district by anything other than $1 stores, a sort of rinky-dink knick-knack vortex of chinese plastic wares. Even the omnipresent ropa usada stores are deserting the downtown area. About the only attraction is the two or three honky-tonk bars where you can still get a $1 mug of beer or the $1.50 bottle of brew. It's a far reach to think that this is anything like a sleeping New Orleans waiting to awaken.
Do we need to speak of what Matamoros offers to those looking for "quality" issues in our sister city to the south of the river?
When we were in high school in the 70s, we used to go en masse to the Zona Rosa to places like the Mustang, Popeyes, etc., and party the night away without a care in the world. The streets would be filled with throngs of kids from the U.S. under the watchful eyes of the local cops. Any problem could be handles with a $100 peso note and you were on your way.
Today, no one with any sense ventures across the river, and if they do, they stay within sight of the Gateway Bridge. If you have family across, you meet in a public place and you borrow someone else's beater bomb instead of taking you new SUV. To do so is to wave a red flag before the bull of either the cartels, the Zetas or the Mañosos. It's just not done.
According to the official news agencies (El Bravo, El Mañana, etc.), Matamoros Mayor Afonso Sanchez Garza presided over the first meting that surveyed the results of the first internal review that the municipality conducted in the process of applying for the "quality" designation.
Something called the Municipal Unity of Public Function under Ing. Edmundo Sosa Cardenas is in charge of the application process.
A successful application will mean more federal dollars for Matamoros, they say. Among some of the other benefits to the citizenry, the public officials claim, is that it will establish "the actions and programs of government to reach them in a quick and efficient manner to those who require them, that city resources are applied in an efficient and orderly manner and that in the mid-term, every area of government count with the necessary tools to better perform its work in benefit of the residents of the city."
Don't they talk pretty?
1 comment:
It is sad to say but true the local government is covering their faces to the reality of the violence. They are only tryiong to get funding from the government because the violence is not giving them an opportunity to do activities to grenate funding. The local government is not producing and the onloy way to get money is to get the town under the quality category.
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