Dear Tico Times:

Please print the following open letter to President Oscar Arias:

Dear Don Oscar:  

Instead of spending more time talking with Panama about the Costa Rica - Panama rail route and buzzing around the Panama Canal expansion project in a helicopter (So much fun! So carbon neutral! Was your brother there? Did he have to pay an extra weight fee?), let's you and me start with a couple of local bridges.

By the way, Guanacaste's showcase tourist town, Tamarindo (big time property tax revenue there), has only about half of its main (and only) artery in any reasonable condition. All other public roads are world-class disasters (I am, like you, well-traveled). God help us if all these condos are ever finished, let alone full.

When you came here last time and met with the rich developers to discuss finishing the access road to the rich developers' empty developments (which really meant simply completing the main artery to Playa Langosta and nothing more) money was exchanged but, alas, little was done.

Ticos are not, as you suggested recently, becoming nattering nabobs of negativity; they actually are one of the few remaining peoples demanding accountability (to wit: the cases of former President Rafael Calderon, and the better-late-than-never former Transprotation Minister Karla González – one gone by demand, one by good conscience).

I'm not sure how good a gold mine would be for Costa Ricans and their environment, and Honduras is important, but as the old saying goes: think globally, act locally. Your global efforts have been exemplary and they've made me proud to say “ Ich bin ein Tico. ” Locally, however, they have been less so.

Gotta go (fix the one and only light in the local public school's third grade classroom, at my expense – and pleasure). Call me!   We'll make lunch instead of “ doing” it.  

Daniel Martin Sheridan
Tamarindo

Dear Tico Times:

Last weekend, when I traveled to Playa Chiquita near Puerto Viejo on the Caribbean coast to visit some friends, I was pleasantly surprised to see that the road heading south from Puerto Limón had been greatly improved.

The last time I was in that area people were desperate because the road from Puerto Viejo south to Manzanillo was in very poor condition, to put it mildly, and it was clear that the local authorities had been turning a deaf ear to their complaints.

Well, I thought, they have finally been heard. Unfortunately, my favorable impression didn't last long. As soon as I left Cahuita, the dream came to an end. The repairs to the road were nowhere to be seen. Not only was the road absolutely ruined, with huge holes everywhere, you really had to want to continue on that road because of the danger of destroying your car.

I know of a lot of people who have built beautiful lodges and shops in the area. These people – from Europe, Canada, the United States and South America – are trying to respect the Caribbean style of life. All of them are nature lovers who chose to live in that zone for a quiet life and provide services to tourists. You would think the Costa Rica government should feel happy about this, especially after the awful experiences at Tamarindo and other beaches where the environment has been ruined and where the aim of developers seems to have been to make a profit, no matter how.

The truth is that very few tourists are going to the southern Caribbean region, and nobody hears the pleas of the people there. Rumors have it that the money allocated for the badly needed road repairs was allocated, but it apparently vanished.

Business people in the region are simply being punished for their attempts to make a living in a harmless way. There are no casinos in sight and no night clubs – just peaceful lodges, restaurants and small shops and the most beautiful, clean beaches that stretch for miles.

Where has the Public Works and Transportation Ministry been all this time? And why aren't these investors granted decent access to their facilities?

I sincerely hope someone with the power to do something about it reads this letter.

Maria Luisa Etchart
Guadalupe

Dear Tico Times:

You recently published a letter from a Gringa who criticized the medical system in the United States and and extolled the virtues of the Costa Rican system (TT, Letters, Sept.4).  

I am a primary care physician in California, and I usually remain silent in the face of attacks on our system by those who are philosophically opposed to our free-market system or who are simply ignorant of the fact there are compromises in the delivery of medical care, just like in everything else.  

It is true that we in the U.S. spend a relatively large amount of money on medical care, but, arguably, we have the most superior medical system in the world.   A recent article in the daily La Nación described how patients with hip arthritis needing hip replacement had to wait three years for the surgery. That stands in sharp contrast to how my patients receive the same operation.   I can send a patient with severe pain due to arthritis with his X-rays, EKG and lab work to an orthopedic surgeon and have him scheduled for surgery within the week.  

Patients without insurance for economic reasons – distinguished from those with funds to buy insurance but who choose not to – may have to wait longer as they must apply for government assistance.   Unfortunately, as we can see in the U.S. at the present, when politicians get into the mix, the public is presented with smoke and mirrors rather than the truth.

James H. Aldrich, M.D., J.D.
San Diego, California,   USA