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 News from Around Banderas Bay | March 2006 
In Their Own Words...
 Doug Davies - PVNN
The controversy surrounding the development of the new La Cruz Marina has captured international attention, calling into question the security of ANY real estate investment by foreigners in Mexico. But what about the beachfront homeowners on "ground zero" in La Cruz... Who are they, where are they from, and what do they have to say?
• Helen W. Chavez, 70, formerly of Portland, OR:
I am the 70-year-old American widow who is being forced from her home by a marina developer who is stealing my waterfront property rights. Before my husband died in 1984 Al and I promised ourselves that we would one day own an oceanfront home in Mexico. After he died I kept the dream alive by continuing visits with the family.
I worked my entire adult life except when my children were young, saving for our dream home in Mexico. I’m not a rich American. I’m living on my pension from my job and social security. In my last job I worked for 23 years as a cookie packer in Portland, Oregon.
After retiring, I decided to realize my dream of living here. I settled on La Cruz de Huanacaxtle because it is an oceanfront fishing village like Al and I always wanted. In 1998 I found my dream home on the beach and decided I wanted to move here in 1999.
I just want to be happy here and have a place for my kids, grandkids and great grandkids to visit. I don’t have a home in Portland anymore because I sold it to move here. This is my home. If they get away with stealing my beachfront property rights, I won’t see the ocean or hear the sound of surf at night. And Al’s and my grandchildren and great-grandchildren will have no beach to go down to when they visit their Grandma.
I can’t go somewhere else and start all over in Mexico; if the Mexican government can’t protect me here, then they can’t protect me anywhere in Mexico. If what’s happening here continues, I will have to move back to Portland.
• Paul E. Gainor, 62, of Detroit, MI and Ghislain Malette, 62, of Windsor, ON, CDA:
I’m American citizen living half-time in Mexico with his life partner, who is Canadian. In 1992 we bought a lot on the very tranquil beach of La Cruz de Huanacaxtle and in 1997 we built the house of our dreams with our modest life savings. This year we completed the final step in the construction of our home with a seawall and garden on the seaside.
We realize that is not possible or desirable to stop progress, but this autumn we returned to our house after a trip to discover a marina development destroying the beach in front of our lot.
No one in the state government of Nayarit, its agencies or the municipal government of the Bahia de Banderas was able or disposed to help us.The developer has been able to destroy this beach without permits or legal permission and the government agencies are looking the other way.
We bought land on the beach and we want to enjoy it in our final years. We don’t want to lose the home of our dreams on the beach. Now we are in our later years and retired and believe that it isn’t fair to snatch this dream from us now.
• David Bender, 70, and Gloria Bender, 59, formerly of Chicago, IL:
As American citizens living fulltime in Mexico, we have been active in the community life of the Puerto Vallarta area over the past five years. Four years ago we helped found a school for economically disadvantaged children whose families could not otherwise afford to provide them with a quality bilingual education.
The school teaches half in Spanish and half in English, so our graduates will be prepared to gain well-paying jobs in the local tourism industry. But more importantly, we teach values. We believe the future of our adopted country of Mexico depends upon leaders who have the character to lead with integrity.
Why is the teaching of moral values important? There is an example right in front of my home on the ocean. Contrary to law and regulations, the developer acted without permits, did no environmental impact study and yet has the backing of the governor of Nayarit and the SEMARNAT director to build an illegal marina.
How can this be? Is Mexico a country that ignores its own laws and regulations? Will no one step up and say, this is morally wrong and cannot be condoned?
• Douglas Davies, 60, and Dru Davies, 57, formerly of Fallbrook, CA:
We have lived in La Cruz for nearly 10 years and operate a property management business that employs many Mexicans and contributes to the local economy. This action to remove the beach in front of our home was done without permits, without following the requirements of the relevant Mexican government agencies and with the tacit or active collaboration of government officials.
We are utterly frustrated that despite the fact we have shown illegality and have our own papers in order, the construction continues daily in front of our homes, creating an environmental disaster zone and devaluing our properties substantially.
We’re in a race against corruption that we are losing day-by-day. The race begins when the work crews turn on two cranes that are filling in the beach in front of our homes. It ends only at dark, because the contractor knows that time is against him. If those in favor of transparency learned of this outrage, certainly they would intervene; and he must complete his work before being found out.
• Douglas F. Jones and Debra Jones of Oklahoma:
I (Douglas Jones) am a mortgage broker who has made millions of dollars in mortgages for foreigners in Mexico.
This shocking land-grab of waterfront property rights is not only causing a rush to leave by waterfront landowners (many homes are for sale), it is now threatening to disrupt mortgage funding from foreign investors, particularly American. This is because the project has gone far beyond original plans. I am one of 18 property-owners who are losing access to the bay, as well as the likelihood of losing a view of the bay.
Lenders, confronted by the value lost in homes they have mortgaged, will withdraw from the Mexican market. This will dry up the mortgage financing which is driving Mexican real estate values up. Foreigners seeking homes abroad will avoid Mexico because they will be unable to get financing, and they will worry that their property rights will not be protected. They will chose other countries;
Foreigners already here will leave--if La Cruz homeowners can lose their waterfront rights, so can they. Besides the losses my neighbors and I will suffer if this construction continues unchanged, I am convinced that Mexico will suffer unstoppable, catastrophic devastation to its economy.
• Susan L. Kurland, Ph.D, school principal, Chicago, IL:
It is disheartening that the Mexican government would, without any consultation with residents here, allow a developer to remove the beach of 18 La Cruz property owners, most of them Americans. The plans, of which we were not informed, creates a 60-meter land buffer between us and the ocean, destroying the beachfront nature of our homes. While I do not object to the construction of a marina in itself and can see the potential of it, I cannot agree to allow the developer to fill in the beach in front of my home and I resent the collusion of the government officials who are sanctioning it.
I am terribly distraught that our paradise is being lost. If this land rights seizure is allowed to stand I will give up my home here and return full-time to the United States.
• Dr. Lars Enevoldsen, 48, and Mrs. Sabrina Enevoldsen, 39, of Modesto, CA:
Earlier this year we bought an oceanfront home in La Cruz and we felt assured that it would be safe.
We have three children--two boys aged 13 and 4 and a girl of 20 months. Our home La Cruz was perfect for our family as the boys could go down to the beach behind the house and play in the sand. They especially enjoyed exploring the tide pools.
Now we are discovering that in fact our friends who warned us were right--we are losing our beautiful oceanfront home that we have worked so hard to afford. Instead of a beach, we now have a logoon filled with dying sealife. Beyond that is a huge dam of rocks and dirt which grows in size daily. Now, when the boys go down to the beach, they are greeted by the stench of decay.
I am a plastic surgeon. Throughout the years I have participated on many missions to Latin America to perform cleft lip and palate surgery on underprivileged children. There is a need for that type of surgery in Nayarit and my plans have been to operate one here. I wanted to operate in one place where I could have meaningful follow-up with the children rather than going to a new location each year. The clinic would be equipped partially through the generosity of my Rotary Club in California and would cost the governments of Nayarit and Mexico nothing.Now that I see what is happening to our home I am becoming discouraged about this project. Can it survive the policies of Mexico any better than the beach has?
The marina can and should be built. But it needs to be done in a way that will not steal our waterfront property rights.
• Greg Lyons, 50, and Susan Lyons, 55, of Lincoln City, OR:
Ten years ago, we invested in an oceanfront home in La Cruz. Though our friends and family in the United States were apprehensive for us, we felt confident investing here because of a change in Mexico's constitution making foreign ownership possible through a bank trust, which specifies the boundaries of our lot, and shows one of those boundaries is on the sea.
So we were shocked when we arrived here in mid-October to discover a road coming from two directions out in the bay in front of our home! As we watched, the road was connected in the middle, leaving still waters like a huge lake in front of us. Clearly this action was meant to be a surreptitious land grab!
If allowed, this "taking" of the beach will greatly devalue our property. We homeowners along the beach are being robbed while this developer is trying to create for himself a multi-million dollar piece of oceanfront property at our expense! What is to be done to protect the status of our property as specified in our legal, supposedly secure, bank trust?
We believe that Mexico risks substantial loss of confidence of a significant group of potential investors if the rights of foreign property owners here are not protected.
To learn more about the La Cruz controversy and read other homeowners' comments visit www.justobeythelaw.com. |
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