Sayausí residents begin painful recovery; Landslide was result of human activity; Some neighborhoods still without water; Ecuador headed to World Cup

Miércoles, 30/3/2022

Hola, Todos –

Actividades –
Nada.

Titular – Fiesta monumental (Monumental celebration) – Ecuador tied with Argentina <even though Argentina has Lionel Messi> in Tuesday night’s game in Guayaquil. Ecuador is going to the Mundiales in Qatar!

Cuenca –

Sayausí vive drama humano (Sayausí lives human drama) – Residents of Sayausí are trying to lift themselves out of the human, economic and material losses they are suffering. In the area affected, most of them are farmers and trout producers. Much of their product was washed away by mud, and they can’t bring what they could salvage to market. One man lost 27,000 of the 30,000 trout he had hoped to sell during Easter. The solidarity of institutions and groups of volunteers are alleviating the desperation with food, medicine, hygiene items, clothing and food for pets, livestock and chickens.

On Wednesday, water was still being delivered by tanker trucks to some areas of Cuenca. (El Mercurio)

A group of 40 people, mostly women from the different communities in the parish have set up a kitchen in the parish house of Sayausí to make 3 meals for the victims, aid workers, uniformados (uniformed workers such as police, military and fire fighters – your word for the day), and machinery operators. They are feeding over 1,000 people. Brigades from the Accíon Social Municipal de Cuenca and others are carrying the food and other supplies to where it is needed. <I know a lot of you complain about Cuencanos not being able to build decent roads, plan ahead, etc, but you can’t complain about how everyone steps up and organizes to provide humanitarian aid.>

Paso emergente (Emergency passage) – Boris Palacios, City coordinator of Mobility, hoped that a narrow passage in the Marianza sector could be opened today. It would allow supplying of food, water and other services. <It’s not that there isn’t enough water; it’s that it isn’t in a usable form.> The passage would initially be for institutional traffic and cars in case of emergencies. Yesterday, MTOP, the Provincial Gov’t, the City of Cuenca and the Parish Junta of Sayausí opened one lane in the slide in the Zorrocucho sector. Clean up of rocks and mud is continuing in the direction of Marianza.

Desastre causado por el hombre (Man-made disaster) – According to Cecilia Méndez, prefect of Azuay, the landslides were a result of blocking the Río Negro creek. In addition to obstruction of water courses, is the deforestation of a large area near the río Culebrillas which is one of the most important tributaries of the río Tomebamba. Juan Manzano, a civil engineer and hydrology researcher, explained that this type of avalanche originates with heavy rain in locations with steep slopes where there are also creeks. This is exactly what happened in Sayausí because there are hundreds of small watercourses in the high areas. It seemed that human intervention eliminated native vegetation which increases the speed of the water, and without vegetation, the water sweeps everything away. <Mother Nature apparently did not like the marine buzz cut humans gave her and is slapping back.> Carlos Molina, an environmental engineer and reforestation specialist, said that the lower part of the río Culebrillas has been cleared over many years for fields and grazing. He felt one solution would be for the City to buy that land and create protected areas. In 2020 the City created Áreas de Conservación y Uso Sustenable (ACUS) to prohibit intervention where there are water sources.

Due to the slides, there were areas of Cuenca without water service from ETAPA. Fire Department water tankers delivered water to various parts of the city including health centers and homes, especially in the south part of the city. The El Cebollar potable water treatment plant was out of service el domingo and part of el lunes, but was functioning at 100% on martes. However there were problems in a pipe from the treatment plant to the reserve tank in the Cruz Verde sector. That tank serves sectors such as 10 de abril, Remigio Crespo, 12 de Abril, & Gapal. For that reason in-person classes were suspended at the Antonio Avila, Miguel Merchán, Bilingue, La Salle schools, and the U. of Cuenca.

Beneficios tributarios para empresas (Tax benefits for companies) – Companies and individuals who finance proposals related to ventures, art, and innovation; cultural heritage; and social memory can apply to deduct 150% of those costs from their income taxes. Artists and managers interested in these benefits need to complete an application form. After that, the businesses need to do the same. The process is on https.//n9.cl/4ya89. After receipt of the applications, the MInisterio de Cultura has 7 working days to approve the application or ask for corrections. <So if any of you pays taxes in Ecuador, needs a tax break, and knows a starving artist – both of you can benefit. This program sounds ripe for exploitation. A rich bananero has a kid. Call that kid an artist, support some bs project of his, and both of you pass GO with heavier wallets.>

El Seguro Campesino tiene a 103 mil afiliados pensionados (The Seguro Campesino has 103 thousand pensioner members) – As of marzo, 103,261 affiliates of the Seguro Social Campesino (SSC) are benefitting from retirement pensions. Of these, 102,941 are receiving benefits for old age and 320 for disability. The cost of the benefits for the first months of 2022 is $11,368,883. To get the benefits, the head of the family needs to go to their SSC medical center with their cedula, bank certificate or bank book and the application to retire. It takes about a month to approve and start getting the pension. The current pension is $110.10 which increases annually at the same percentage as the SBU. <If that’s true, the SSC must have the fastest bureaucracy in Ecuador.> The pensioner has to have paid a minimum of 120 months (10 years) into the system and be between 65 & 70.

And that’s all for today so Hasta ? –

Jeanne
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Editor’s note: Jeanne’s Periodico is a translated digest of news from the Cuenca daily newspaper El Mercurio. If details, such as event dates and times, do not appear in the translation, they did not appear in the newspaper (please don’t ask her for them). The text between the carrots, or guillemets (< … >), is Jeanne’s personal opinion and not part of the news translation.