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| A.M. Costa Rica's Second news page | |||||||||
| San José, Costa Rica, Tuesday, Dec. 20, 2011, Vol. 11, No. 251 | |||||||||
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bandits hijacked his load By
the A.M. Costa Rica staff
A trailer-truck driver toting a load of beans was stopped, tied up and relieved of his cargo Sunday night in a coordinated highway robbery, said the Judicial Investigating Organization. According to the judicial police, the driver, identified by the name of Méndez, was passing by a toll station in Atenas heading to Turrúcares when a car and a pick-up truck, with the drivers working together, boxed in his vehicle and forced Méndez to stop. Then, an armed assailant appeared and he and another accomplice bound Méndez' feet and hands with his own shoe-laces, according to the investigative report. Méndez said in the report he didn't see their faces, but one of the supposed hijackers began to drive the trailer-truck. Eventually, the hijacker stopped, and, Méndez said in the report, after being stopped for some time he realized the two robbers were no longer in the truck with him. So, he freed himself and walked back to his trailer to find 430 sacks of beans had presumably been stolen, according to the report. Agents report Méndez was left in the sector Alto de Ochomogo. Taxi driver accused of running cocaine route By
the A.M. Costa Rica staff
A cab driver in Puntarenas was nabbed last weekend on an allegation of selling cocaine from his taxi as he make rounds of local bars to deliver the goods. The Judicial Investigating Organization agents stationed in Puntarenas claim to have conducted surveillance and monitoring of the suspect since October. They then apprehended the 35-year-old man outside of a bar over the weekend. The agency reports they apprehended the subject along with cocaine and other illicit items in his taxi. Our readers' opinions
Tax collectors should getcommission as incentive Dear A.M. Costa Rica: The excuses are usually three: not enough tax collectors, not enough money to pay them and not enough incentive to pursue the extraordinary percentage of people who don't pay. Single solution: hire tax collectors and pay them a commission, a percentage of the taxes they collect. Lenny
Karpman
La Guacima Which person is a cop? Dear A.M. Costa Rica: Regarding your article "Don't ask the municipal cop to see a badge now, " how is one supposed to know who is a real police and who is an impostor? The real police no longer has a badge while impostors wear police uniforms. Dennis
Jay
Alajuela.
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| What we published this week: | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday | Friday | Earlier |
| The contents of this page and this Web site are copyrighted by Consultantes Río Colorado 2011 and may not be reproduced anywhere without permission. Abstracts and fair use are permitted. Check HERE for details | ||||||
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| A.M. Costa Rica Third
News Page |
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| San José, Costa Rica, Tuesday, Dec. 20, 2011, Vol. 11, No. 251 | |
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| Today is a deadline for paying workers
Christmas aguinaldo |
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By Andrew Rulseh Kasper
and the A.M. Costa Rica staff Today is the last day for employers to pay their staffs the 2011 aguinaldo. This is the legally mandated 13th month of salary. Although some struggling employers will drag out the payments, employees have the right to complain to the labor ministry, which will open a file and hound the employer. Eventually legal action may be forthcoming. The amount is one of the easiest sums to figure in Costa Rica. Employers simply add up salaries from December 2010 until the end of November 2011 and divide by 12. For domestic help who receive payment in kind, the aguinaldo is supposed to reflect the non-cash payments, like food and housing. |
The Ministerio de Trabajo is the
place for employees to complain, but
workers there also are prepared to help employers who have questions. Workers who left the job earlier in the year were supposed to have been paid their aguinaldo, vacation and other mandated amounts then. Aguinaldos and vacation pay are benefits that even workers who are fired for cause receive. Costa Ricans live for the aguinaldo. Many work for minimum wage, and the Christmas bonus gives them a little extra to make needed purchases as well as enjoy the holiday. A reporter asked a handful of Costa Ricans what plans they had for their Christmas windfall. What follows are the responses: |
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Carlos
Luis Solano Villalta, 55,
San José Municipal employee They already gave me my aguinaldo, and I already spent all of it. They gave me 400,000 colons and I paid to have a new septic tank installed. I spent 200,000 on the manual labor and the rest on materials. It was a necessity and a good investment. It will last me 20 years or more. I've been waiting for my aguinaldo to buy this septic system. |
Rafael
Morales, 48,
construction supervisor I'm going to be hung over. I will have a big Christmas party with lots of Imperial beer, pork and tamales, the typical Christmas food in Costa Rica. I'm going to invite all my friends and family to come. |
Edwin
Hernandez, 51,
van driver for Sportsmen's Lodge I am going to buy presents for my kids and my family, things such as clothes, shirts, jeans, shoes, all useful stuff. My kids are older so I don't need to buy them toys anymore. I will also buy food for Christmas dinner, although I may have to work on Dec. 24 and Dec. 25 because it is a popular time for tourists to travel. But this year tourism is down. |
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Jairo
Bermudez, 24,
Fuerza Pública police officer I bought clothes for myself and my family. I have to work during Christmas, so I can't spend the whole day with my family but I bought my kids presents, little toy cars to play with. I also bought other presents for my family members. |
Carolina
Arias Hernandez, 19,
student, bartender and waitress I didn't save any of it. I bought some toys, a water gun and some clothes. I also helped pay a dentist bill for my dad. My aguinaldo wasn't that big because for waitresses the 10 percent service charge does not count, only the hourly wages. I didn't save any of it. |
Edine
von Herold Duarte, 57, pediatrician and former legislator
I'm going to change the money into dollars and save it for my son. He's studying medicine right now, and I want him to have an opportunity to study for a practicum rotation at Harvard after he graduates. But it will be expensive. I have to save this one and my next one and spend all my money. |
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| You need to see Costa Rican tourism information HERE! |
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| What we published this week: | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday | Friday | Earlier |
| The contents of this page and this Web site are copyrighted by Consultantes Río Colorado 2011 and may not be reproduced anywhere without permission. Abstracts and fair use are permitted. Check HERE for details | ||||||
| A.M.
Costa Rica's Fourth news page |
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| San José, Costa Rica, Tuesday, Dec. 20, 2011, Vol. 11, No. 251 | |||||||||
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| Mother whose daughter died here documents
events in a book |
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By
Zack McDonald
of the A.M. Costa Rica staff Jennifer Scalise, the mother of a young accident victim, will be releasing her book detailing the tragedy that befell her family in, what her Web site describes as, ¨a heartless foreign government.¨ The heartless foreign government in question: Costa Rica. In her non-fiction work, ¨A Mother´s Journey of Love, Loss & Life Beyond," Ms. Scalise documents her account of the last days of a family vacation in Costa Rica and the events that claimed the life of her 12-year-old daughter, Brooke Scalise. Ms. Scalise´s daughter died in a quadracycle accident July 13, 2009, near Flamingo, Santa Cruz, Guanacaste. She was driving the all-terrain vehicle accompanying friends and family, including her mother, when she failed to make a curve and went over a cliff. On JenniferScaliseauthor.com, there is video of Brooke Scalise riding a quadracycle on the day of her death. In the video, a brief flash of the ATV crashed and upturned on the rocks at the bottom of the 260-foot-drop can be seen. Audio then plays of the police officer telling Ms. Scalise her daughter had died more than a half hour ago. Ms. Scalise has said they were traveling at high speed in order to keep up with the tour guide. The guide took the group along a cliff top path they were never supposed to be on, with no caution signs and without guardrails, according to Ms. Scalise. She has since been vigorous in promoting changes to the law that would have protected youngsters like her daughter. In an earlier story in A.M. Costa Rica Ms. Scalise said Costa Rica ¨needs change and regulations to prevent future tragic deaths such as this. The tour company does need to be held accountable for this death. |
 Cover
of the book by Ms. Scalise
"I am an extremely responsible mother,¨ she added, ¨and had I thought there was serious risk of danger I would have never permitted my family to participate in this tour. We were never warned of any dangers, never signed a waiver, and the owner of the tour knew we had two 6-year-olds and a 7-year-old with us." Ms. Scalise had book signings over the weekend in Missouri and expects the book will be available on Amazon and other retail stores early in 2012. |
No rowdy visitors to Casa Presidencial Perhaps the most sedate and smallest demonstration on record took place outside Casa Presidencial Monday. Widows of taxi drivers came to press their case that they should be able to inherit the license held by their late husbands. That requires a change in the law, which most legislators support, but the executive branch has frozen the measure in favor of the proposed tax plan. Police had even blocked off the street in anticipation of a major turnout of taxi drivers. |
 A.M. Costa Rica/Shahrazad Encinias Vela
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| What we published this week: | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday | Friday | Earlier |
| The contents of this page and this Web site are copyrighted by Consultantes Río Colorado 2011 and may not be reproduced anywhere without permission. Abstracts and fair use are permitted. Check HERE for details | ||||||
| A.M.
Costa Rica's Fifth news page |
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| San José, Costa Rica, Tuesday, Dec. 20, 2011, Vol. 11, No. 251 | |||||||||
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 Predicted percentage of ecological landscape being driven toward changes in plant species as a result of projected human-induced climate change by 2100. Computer study predicts vast ecosystem changes By
the National Aeronautics and Space Administration
and Jet Propulsion Laboratory news staff By 2100, global climate change will modify plant communities covering almost half of Earth's land surface and will drive the conversion of nearly 40 percent of land-based ecosystems from one major ecological community type - such as forest, grassland or tundra - toward another, according to a new National Aeronautics and Space Administration and university computer modeling study. Researchers from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory and the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, California, investigated how Earth's plant life is likely to react over the next three centuries as Earth's climate changes in response to rising levels of human-produced greenhouse gases. Study results are published in the journal Climatic Change. The model projections paint a portrait of increasing ecological change and stress in Earth's biosphere, with many plant and animal species facing increasing competition for survival, as well as significant species turnover, as some species invade areas occupied by other species. Most of Earth's land that is not covered by ice or desert is projected to undergo at least a 30 percent change in plant cover, changes that will require humans and animals to adapt and often relocate. In addition to altering plant communities, the study predicts climate change will disrupt the ecological balance between interdependent and often endangered plant and animal species, reduce biodiversity and adversely affect Earth's water, energy, carbon and other element cycles. "For more than 25 years, scientists have warned of the dangers of human-induced climate change," said Jon Bergengren, a scientist who led the study while a postdoctoral scholar at Caltech. "Our study introduces a new view of climate change, exploring the ecological implications of a few degrees of global warming. While warnings of melting glaciers, rising sea levels and other environmental changes are illustrative and important, ultimately, it's the ecological consequences that matter most." When faced with climate change, plant species often must migrate over multiple generations, as they can only survive, compete and reproduce within the range of climates to which they are evolutionarily and physiologically adapted. While Earth's plants and animals have evolved to migrate in response to seasonal environmental changes and to even larger transitions, such as the end of the last ice age, they often are not equipped to keep up with the rapidity of modern climate changes that are currently taking place. Human activities, such as agriculture and urbanization, are increasingly destroying Earth's natural habitats, and frequently block plants and animals from successfully migrating. To study the sensitivity of Earth's ecological systems to climate change, the scientists used a computer model that predicts the type of plant community that is uniquely adapted to any climate on Earth. This model was used to simulate the future state of Earth's natural vegetation in harmony with climate projections from 10 different global climate simulations. These simulations are based on the intermediate greenhouse gas scenario in the United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Fourth Assessment Report. That scenario assumes greenhouse gas levels will double by 2100 and then level off. The U.N. report's climate simulations predict a warmer and wetter Earth, with global temperature increases of 3.6 to 7.2 degrees Fahrenheit (2 to 4 degrees Celsius) by 2100, about the same warming that occurred following the Last Glacial Maximum almost 20,000 years ago, except about 100 times faster. Under the scenario, some regions become wetter because of enhanced evaporation, while others become drier due to changes in atmospheric circulation. The researchers found a shift of biomes, or major ecological community types, toward Earth's poles - most dramatically in temperate grasslands and boreal forests - and toward higher elevations. Ecologically sensitive hotspots - areas projected to undergo the greatest degree of species turnover - that were identified by the study include regions in the Himalayas and the Tibetan Plateau, eastern equatorial Africa, Madagascar, the Mediterranean region, southern South America, and North America's Great Lakes and Great Plains areas. The largest areas of ecological sensitivity and biome changes predicted for this century are, not surprisingly, found in areas with the most dramatic climate change: in the Northern Hemisphere high latitudes, particularly along the northern and southern boundaries of boreal forests. |
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A.M. Colombia |
A.M. Guatemala |
A.M. Honduras |
A.M. Havana |
A.M. Nicaragua |
| A.M. Venezuela |
A.M. Central America |
A.M. Dominican Republic |
A.M. Ecuador | A.M. San Salvador |
A.M. Bolivia |
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| What we published this week: | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday | Friday | Earlier |
| The contents of this page and this Web site are copyrighted by Consultantes Río Colorado 2011 and may not be reproduced anywhere without permission. Abstracts and fair use are permitted. Check HERE for details | ||||||
| A.M.
Costa
Rica's sixth news page |
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| San José, Costa Rica, Tuesday, Dec. 20, 2011, Vol. 11, No. 251 | ||||||||||
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Latin America news |
taken on vehicle deaths By
the A.M. Costa Rica staff
Prosecutors have decided not to take immediate action against the drivers of two cars that killed two woman early Saturday in San Pablo de Heredia. The Poder Judicial said that both drivers were questioned as were witnesses, and prosecutors concluded that the men were not engaged in a drag race. Instead, the vehicles were one behind the other, said the Poder Judicial. In addition, the women were crossing the highway wearing dark clothing in a place where there was no pedestrian crossing, the Poder Judicial added. Because the two drivers are Costa Rican, prosecutors did not seek any court restrictions on their movements at this time, said the Poder Judicial. Meanwhile their vehicles are being examined as prosecutors await the results of autopsies. The motorists were not drunk nor do they have any prior convictions, said the Poder Judicial. Still, the way in which the women crossed the road will not have an effect on any future criminal proceeding, said the Poder Judicial. Soccer federation worried about Brazil's capability By
the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
The president of soccer’s world governing body says it is "concerned" about Brazil's preparations for the 2014 World Cup. Sepp Blatter, president of the Fédération Internationale de Football Association, said Saturday after an association executive meeting in Tokyo that he will meet with the Brazilian government in the coming year to discuss its readiness for the tournament. The Fédération Internationale de Football Association said it has not received the necessary government guarantees about the organization of the event. The French news agency reports Brazil needs more than $11 billion in investment to fix roads, boost hotel capacity, reinforce security and develop its telecommunications network ahead of the World Cup. Pope warns of shadow of youthful frustrations By
the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
The pope has an urgent warning as much of the world prepares to mark the New Year 2012. In a message released for the Catholic Church's World Day of Peace on Jan. 1, Pope Benedict XVI warns, "It seems as if a shadow has fallen over our time." He cites a rising sense of frustration, especially among young people, as economic problems and unemployment continue to plague parts of the world. The pontiff urges world leaders to stop focusing too much on profit and material possessions, calling the intense focus a threat to human dignity. Pope Benedict's message comes after a year when protesters took to the streets — from Tunisia and Egypt to New York and London — to demand political and economic changes. The German-born pope says young people need hope and guidance. He urged world leaders to make sure young people and young families have access to adequate education and support programs. Pope Benedict also urges young people not to give into discouragement, saying they can offer new hope to the world. |
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| Costa Rican News |
AMCostaRicaArchives.com |
Retire NOW in Costa Rica |
CostaRicaReport.com |
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| What we published this week: | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday | Friday | Earlier |
| The contents of this page and this Web site are copyrighted by Consultantes Río Colorado 2011 and may not be reproduced anywhere without permission. Abstracts and fair use are permitted. Check HERE for details | ||||||
| An A.M. Costa
Rica editorial (sort of) Embassy's electric car is culmination of long U.S. project |
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By
the A.M. Costa Rica humor staff
The search for the perfect embassy vehicle began decades
Benjamin Franklin's misadventure with a sedan chair while
 A
vintage tuk tuk
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 Still
being considered
And the real tight-fisted ones have not given up on their push for a pedicab. Yet these still produce that dreaded carbon dioxide. Still in the works is a secret U.S. Navy project to teleport diplomats to their various cocktail parties and receptions so there will be no need for heavily armored tuk tuks. |
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James
DeRoy
