Puerto Vallarta, Mexico - The Conchas Chinas Homeowners Association (CCHA), a group of Puerto Vallarta residents dedicated to improving and maintaining the residential quality and beauty of the Conchas Chinas community, brings us up to date on what's happening in the colonia.

The current city administration has shown a renewed interest in the more than 300 colonias that make up Puerto Vallarta. The city is divided into 30 sectors that include all the colonias. Each sector has a designated coordinator who works as a liaison between that sector and the Presidencia.

This system is part of the Participación Ciudadana program designed to connect the city government with the people and their colonias. Each colonia has the right to form a Junta Vecinal which is the organization authorized to represent the colonia to the city.

Our aim was to create the Conchas Chinas Junta Vecinal to help reestablish a working relationship with the city government. We were pleased that Jorge Martínez Romero, the Coordinator for the sector that includes Conchas Chinas, was present at the annual meeting. He has already assisted us in filing several petitions concerning lighting repairs, noise issues, street repairs, etc.

The board members of the Junta Vecinal must be either Mexican citizens or permanent residents. With this in mind, the following people were elected to serve on the first Junta Vecinal of Conchas Chinas.

Mesa Directiva Primer Junta Vecinal
President: Peter Roy Bowman Goppet
Secretary: Tari Lynne Sigman Schoen
Treasurer: John Cotton
Vocal 1: Judy Sorrel
Vocal 2: Silvia Gómez Davila
Vocal 3: Salvador Correa
Vocal 4: Matt Richard Corbett

To improve the neighborhood, your board has presented the following petitions to the city:

1. Clean the ditch in Paseo de los Delfines.
2. Install a high intensity lamp in the Mirador upper Conchas Chinas.
3. Repair the sidewalks in Delfines and Paseo Caracoles.
4. Repair the sidewalk in Paseo de las Madre Perlas.
5. Remove and relocate the garbage containers on the highway near the south entrance.
6. Replace damaged lamps.
7. Increase security in the colonia.

Your CCHA has already begun to see the benefits of our newly formed Junta Vecinal. On Friday, March 17, 2017, members of the board met with the city's representative, Jorge Martínez and several people from his office as well as Benigno Lara (Chief of Garbage Collection) who is in charge of the Federal Program for the containers along the highway and Mauro Rubio, Comandante of Vecino Vigilante y Cero Tolerancia.

Sr. Lara said that he would do the following: starting after the holiday weekend he would make sure that the containers were inspected, cleaned and replaced with new ones as soon as possible. After Semana Santa they would be relocated.

Your CCHA is committed to planting more plants to enhance the appearance of that area.

Among other issues discussed, was the level of noise coming from Mirador, Villa Celeste, and Villa Azul. The city is now willing to cooperate in controlling noise. We were told that excessive noise is defined as "noise that is bothering the neighbors." Any time of day we were encouraged to call 911 and to report any excessive noise that you are experiencing in your area.

English and Spanish speaking staff is supposed to be available to take your call. If your villa or your condominium is being affected by loud noise, please have as many people call as possible. We were told that the police would come out as many times as is necessary to deal with this.

CCHA suggests that if you are having a continuing problem with noise please keep a log of this backed up with videos and pictures. The CCHA hopes that the police will be effective in dealing with this.