Quick Scan: Mejicanos part 2
Quick Scan Report: Mejicanos: Montreal, Iberia & Guadalupe
Accompanied by: Victor & Hector (Municipality Mejicanos) + Sofia (UCA)
Date: 17/03/09
Time: 09:00-13:00
Introduction
We visited a part of Mejicanos on Thursday, March 12th. Mejicanos is a municipality just north of the municipality of San Salvador and part of the greater San Salvador. It has a population approximately 165 thousand people, of whom mostly earn there money in the city centre. In 6 zones of the municipal, an amount of 25 000 dollars was distributed over 26 communities for the reconstruction and prevention of disasters and social programs. Today we visited a couple of communities, the main focus was on: Montreal (32 families: 4-7 persons/family), Iberia & Guadalupe.
Team
For this visit we teamed up with our contact Sofia from the student association at UCA. She helped translating while we were guided around by Hector and Victor of the municipal. At the municipal they work on reconstruction after a disaster: earthquake and yearly landslides/floods caused by heavy rain. We finished the day with a meeting reported in Meeting Report: Antonio Rodriguez.
Community house and necessities
Every community we visited is vulnerable to heavy rains, because they are enclosed by the hills. On the scale of liveability we observed the houses and accessibilities to necessities for human life. We asked around for the flows of food and medicines and learned that the communities are depended on San Salvador, while only connected with one entrance. Most of the houses are constructed with steel sheets, wooden logs and bricks. But there are also house constructed with concrete blocks. These are more resistant and a couple of these serve as a community house. Because of the repetitive floods and landslides, the community is prepared. During the rain season the municipal measures the rain fall and when necessary all the people gather in a community house. Most of the community houses are partially renovated vacant houses. In the community Montreal these vacant houses are owned by the bank but nobody is taking care of the maintenance and nobody is living in them. The municipal constructed plastic and wooden roofs for these houses, which were destroyed by the heavy rain/landslide. In the community Guadalupe a construction took place and it’s the only example where we saw public space directly connected with the community house. This is used for weekly meetings and other gathering. The community house in Iberia is the most organized in the sense of the necessities. The community made a plan a presented this in order to get international help from Germany. They implemented a sanitation system for the neighborhood, with a system of tubes where black and clean water are transported separately within one pipe. For example Montreal also has clean water system but not a sanitation network.
Incentives
While these communities are not far away from each other, the responses are very diverse. NGOs like Fundasal, Procomes, Cantizano, Oxfam and Ayuda Humanitairs helped in different fields like water, sanitation and infrastructure. While construction companies like Avance ingenieros built a gated settlement nearby. A lot of international help lead to improvement of facilities, like the Catholic school in Iberia initiated by the Spanish embassy.
Social problems
While the area is very vulnerable to natural disasters and heavy rain, the main problems seem to be social. In the communities we visited social safety is an issue because there is gang activity. The collaboration between the national government and the municipalities is inefficient, because of political differences (see Meeting Report: Antonio Rodriguez). The municipal do want they can with the small amount of finance, resulting in construction of small playing areas, walls and with help from NGO or international actors implementations like water/sanitation systems, staircases and roads.
Potentiality
Accompanied by: Victor & Hector (Municipality Mejicanos) + Sofia (UCA)
Date: 17/03/09
Time: 09:00-13:00
Introduction
We visited a part of Mejicanos on Thursday, March 12th. Mejicanos is a municipality just north of the municipality of San Salvador and part of the greater San Salvador. It has a population approximately 165 thousand people, of whom mostly earn there money in the city centre. In 6 zones of the municipal, an amount of 25 000 dollars was distributed over 26 communities for the reconstruction and prevention of disasters and social programs. Today we visited a couple of communities, the main focus was on: Montreal (32 families: 4-7 persons/family), Iberia & Guadalupe.
Team
For this visit we teamed up with our contact Sofia from the student association at UCA. She helped translating while we were guided around by Hector and Victor of the municipal. At the municipal they work on reconstruction after a disaster: earthquake and yearly landslides/floods caused by heavy rain. We finished the day with a meeting reported in Meeting Report: Antonio Rodriguez.
Community house and necessities
Every community we visited is vulnerable to heavy rains, because they are enclosed by the hills. On the scale of liveability we observed the houses and accessibilities to necessities for human life. We asked around for the flows of food and medicines and learned that the communities are depended on San Salvador, while only connected with one entrance. Most of the houses are constructed with steel sheets, wooden logs and bricks. But there are also house constructed with concrete blocks. These are more resistant and a couple of these serve as a community house. Because of the repetitive floods and landslides, the community is prepared. During the rain season the municipal measures the rain fall and when necessary all the people gather in a community house. Most of the community houses are partially renovated vacant houses. In the community Montreal these vacant houses are owned by the bank but nobody is taking care of the maintenance and nobody is living in them. The municipal constructed plastic and wooden roofs for these houses, which were destroyed by the heavy rain/landslide. In the community Guadalupe a construction took place and it’s the only example where we saw public space directly connected with the community house. This is used for weekly meetings and other gathering. The community house in Iberia is the most organized in the sense of the necessities. The community made a plan a presented this in order to get international help from Germany. They implemented a sanitation system for the neighborhood, with a system of tubes where black and clean water are transported separately within one pipe. For example Montreal also has clean water system but not a sanitation network.
Incentives
While these communities are not far away from each other, the responses are very diverse. NGOs like Fundasal, Procomes, Cantizano, Oxfam and Ayuda Humanitairs helped in different fields like water, sanitation and infrastructure. While construction companies like Avance ingenieros built a gated settlement nearby. A lot of international help lead to improvement of facilities, like the Catholic school in Iberia initiated by the Spanish embassy.
Social problems
While the area is very vulnerable to natural disasters and heavy rain, the main problems seem to be social. In the communities we visited social safety is an issue because there is gang activity. The collaboration between the national government and the municipalities is inefficient, because of political differences (see Meeting Report: Antonio Rodriguez). The municipal do want they can with the small amount of finance, resulting in construction of small playing areas, walls and with help from NGO or international actors implementations like water/sanitation systems, staircases and roads.
Potentiality
QS: Mejicanos2
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