PEGGY CHILTON ALBUM COVER.

Patrick O’Heffernan, Ajijic. Lakeside resident and former film and television and singing celebrity Peggy Lord Chilton will be the star of the Lakeside Little Theater’s Legacy video series this month.  Chilton has a long career including acting in 17 films – several shot in Mexico, numerous television shows, a popular folk  singer opening for Peter Paul and Mary and the Kingston Trio, and a tour of Playboy Clubs across the nation as a singing comedian.  She moved to Lakeside in 2009 and has directed or appeared in numerous LLT productions, including Pajama Game and Nunsense, and plans to stay involved as a director or actress.

In a pre-interview conversation, Chilton  – once known as “the Lusty, Trusty, Buster” – described parties at the Playboy Mansion, meeting Phyllis Diller  for gossip in an alley between nightclubs, how her pet ocelot protected her, and being told early in her career by one club owner he hoped she was better that the previous singer, someone named Barbara Streisand.  

Produced by JeanMarie Harmon, and filmed and edited by Jim Jack, the Lakeside Little Theater Legacy Project is a YouTube video series featuring some of the legacy talent in Lakeside to give a quick peek at their lives before and during their time at LLT. Currently, the series is featuring Broadway dancer, actress and choreographer Barbara Clippinger at www.lakesidelittletheatre.com/

Erika Navarro puts her students and their stick horses through their paces

Patrick O’Heffernan, Ajijic. Led by former Escaramuza champion Erika Navarro, the Escaramuza Pedagógica Las Potranquitas Ajijic kicked off its season with its first practice Wednesday night at the Ajijic Lienzo Charro bullring.  The girls, aged 4 – 8, and one little boy, began their weekly drills in very good form as Navarro used voce command (and an encouraging huddle) to get them back in shape after a summer off.

Photography: Patrick O’Heffernan.

The Escaramuza Pedagógica Las Potranquitas Ajijic trains many of the girls who go on to ride real horses in competitive Escaramuza performances at Charros in Chapala and other cities.  The Ajijic Potranquitas team went to the first level of national competition last year with financial support from local doors and horse lovers. The public is welcome to observe the Wednesday night practice from the stands of Lienzo Charro, beginning at 6 pm.

Photography: Patrick O’Heffernan.

Photography: Patrick O’Heffernan.

Photo: Patrick O’Heffernan

Patrick O’Heffernan, Ajijic. Santa and his elves arrived Saturday afternoon at the Chapala Police Department on motorcycles to distribute presents to over 40 children of Chapala’s police offices as part of a program launched by the Auxiliary of American Legion Post 7 and the Los Güeros  Motorcycle Club of Lakeside, with involvement from the Anavets of Canada.

When Los Güeros club arrived with roaring pipes at the assembly yard of the Chapala Police Department, they were met by children, police officers, officials from the American Legion Auxiliary, Mayor Moises Anaya, and other dignitaries.  The children were waiting patiently with their families at tables under special tents set up for the occasion.

Project Manager Gloria Allen of the Auxiliary served as Mistress of Ceremonies for the event, flanked by project volunteers Lenel Tamez, Loretta Pompeii Flick, and Irene Nottingham and officials from Chapala.  Allen introduced the dignitaries, including Chapala Police Chief Moisés Torres Ramírez, each of whom thanked the police for their work and the participating organizations for their generosity.

“This is in gratitude for the work of the police in keeping us safe,” Allen told Laguna, noting that in her welcome speech, she said she worked closely with Olga Ramirez who “made this event possible.” The Auxiliary also collected funds and toys and provided candy at the event.

American Legion Post 7 Auxiliary, Los Gueros Motorcycle Club and Anavets distribute gifts and candy to the children of Chapala’s police to say “thank you for keeping us safe.”

This is the first year Allen has coordinated the gift distribution, which will also include the Chapala Bomberos next week and the Love in Action Children’s Home on Christmas Eve.  The program started when Allen was contacted by the Los Gueros Toy Run and learned that they had collected toys but could not have their annual Toy Run to distribute gifts.  Allen linked the volunteers of the Post 7 Auxiliary together with the Los Gueros and brought in Anavets to organize three distribution events, the first one with the children of the Police last Saturday.

“Cindy Bosch of the Los Gueros Motorcycle Club told me they had these toys but couldn’t distribute them, so we were delighted to put this together, especially since Post 7 has been involved in the Toy Run for 5 years, Allen told Laguna.

The Annual Los Gueros Motorcycle Club Toy Run is held to provide a good Christmas for the underpaid frontline public servants in Chapala, as well as other children whose families cannot afford presents.  

The 35 to 40 children present were almost outnumbered by the motorcycles that roared into the Police Department’s assembly space, near Suriana Market in Chapala and they loved every minute of it, except for the speeches. They happily lined up with their parents to receive gifts and then went back to the table for a special lunch.

Cortesía. 

Miguel Cerna: Anonymous signs have been posted in the streets of Jocotepec offering newborn puppies for sale, an action prohibited by the Regulations for the Well-being and Dignified Treatment of Animals in Jocotepec.

The director of Ecology, Diego Palmeros Suárez, attributed the purchase and sale of dogs to the Christmas season, a time of year when many families give them away as pets; although he did not rule out the possibility of also using them for training fighting dogs. 

Palmeros Suarez warned those involved that these actions are prohibited in the municipal regulations and that the sale of animals on the street was also illegal. 

«The regulations do not allow you to do that (buying and selling. You need to be registered, in case of a kennel, you have to hand in all the papers, a veterinarian who is aware of them, etc.; besides explaining what they are going to be used for,» he said in an interview. 

In addition, the Animal Welfare and Treatment Regulations of the Municipality of Jocotepec do not allow sales on streets, highways or any other location that does not have the corresponding permits. 

Animal protection activists like non-Mexican association «Tails of Mexico» and Rescate Canino Jocotepec, asked people to remove the signs to stop the mistreatment and suffering of the puppies.

Another problem in the Christmas season is increase in the number of stray animals abandoned by their families  so they can replace them replace them with puppies”, explained Diego Palmeros. 

«The problem has grown a little lately, because of the season, people who want to remove an older dog so they pretend they lost it or that it ran away; the child becomes sad and the parents buy another one», he explained. 

Added to the inhuman conditions in which the dogs are found in the streets, dog poisoning is another problem people need to be aware of due to the frequency with which it happens. The last dog poisoning was registered last December 7th in the center of the town, which, after hours of agony from the poison, the poisoned dog was put to sleep. 

Diego Palmeros said that the poisoning of dogs is the result of a vicious circle that starts with a lack of education for the care of animals, so he invited the population to adopt to prevent the problem of street fauna from getting worse. 

» It’s like a chain: I abandon a dog, it is wandering the streets,  it acts according to its instincts to look for food; it makes garbage, people get angry, kick them and even poison them,» he said. 

Translated by patrick o’heffernan

Patrick O’Heffernan

In the late 1960s, after a century of complaints, the governors of the North American states of California and Nevada approved a bi-state compact to protect Lake Tahoe, the largest freshwater lake west of the Rocky Mountains.  They created the Tahoe Regional Planning Agency to oversee development around Lake Tahoe, which is slightly smaller than Lake Chapala.  TRPA was approved by the United States Congress and tasked with creating a plan with the local cities and agencies. Today that plan is enforced by TRPA and federal, state, and local governments that strictly regulate development.

Lake Chapala is now facing the same kind of crisis Lake Tahoe faced 60 years ago.  But Lake Chapala is far more vital to the people of its surrounding states and towns than the mostly recreational Lake Tahoe is.  Lake Chapala, Mexico’s largest natural lake, is the linchpin of a  gigantic eco and economic system, the River Lerma-Lake Chapala drainage basin, which includes more than 8 million people, 3,500 diverse industries, 750,000 hectares of irrigated farmland and 14 cities with populations in excess of 100,000.  And it is under deadly stress.

Lake Chapala is beset by pesticide runoff, dehydration, algal blooms, high phosphorus levels, heavy metals, aquatic weeds, sewage, and loss of shoreline.  Driving much of this is illegal appropriation of the Federal shoreline and water – illegal dumping in Jocotepec for merry-go-rounds, illegal building on the beach in Ajijic by restaurants, illegal filling for farms in Riberas, garbage dumped in the lake from west Ajijic to Chapala, illegal fishermen, untreated sewage  – they are all  killing the lake.  

Why?  Because there is little to no enforcement.

Chapala, Jocotepec, Jalisco and the Federal governments all have agencies whose responsibility is to protect the Lake we all love, the largest lake in Mexico. And they all fail.

The problem is not weak laws, or lack of scientific expertise, or ignorance of the problems or corrupt or underperforming officials.   It is lack of political will.

As far back as 1997, there was call for international pressure on Mexico, similar to the Canadian lobbying that led to the conservation of Monarch butterfly habitat, to detail the Lake’s problems and develop a multi-state, regional-national effort to save the Lake. But this takes will and money.  The agencies whose job it is to protect the Lake are underfunded, overworked and undercoordinated. And that is the failure, not of the good people who manage and staff the agencies, but of political will to give them the authority and resource they need to succeed.

The Lakeshore is Federal, but the local office of the Federal agency is understaffed – so much so that when Chapala Mayor Moisés Anaya Aguilar took its director on a tour of illegal appropriation of Federal shoreline he was told that there are too many problems and too few resources to do much.  Local agencies have no authority to act and Federal agencies have no capability to act.  And AMLO has other priorities.

Some progress is being made, mostly in uncoordinated fits and starts.  There is a move to devolve enforcement authority to the local governments.  But that will be a wack-a-mole game that ignores the major problems and will meet fierce pushback.  Without a regional plan, progress monitoring, funds from the Federal government for enforcement officers and equipment, sewage treatment plants, shoreline rehabilitation, and prosecution, it will fail.

Which is where political will comes in.  The lake can be protected if the people demand it.   In this week’s Laguna, reporter Sofia Medeles chronicles how the online complaints of a citizen finally prodded coordinated governmental action to stop illegal beach appropriation by the Maria Isabel restaurant in Ajijic.  It will take many –thousands   – of citizen complaints to get the sewage treatment plants built, stop the pesticide runoff, prosecute the lakeshore invasions, and regulate fishing and tourism to save the Lake. And it may take international pressure to get the Federal government to generously fund state and local agencies and give them the authority to get the job done.

The Tahoe Regional Planning Agency could be a model for Lake Chapala’s future. A scientifically-based plan with clear progress benchmarks backed up by determination in state, federal and local governments overcame lethargy and opposition in Lake Tahoe.   It might work here.  But it took the people of California and Nevada 100 years of complaining, pressuring and voting to create the political will. Lake Chapala does not have 100 years

Foto: Patrick O’Heffernan.

Ajijic’s own global music radio program, Music Sin Fronteras, hosted by music critic and writer for the English page on Semanario Laguna , Patrick O’Heffernan, will now be available at semanariolaguna.com/.  Each week, Laguna readers will get an advance peek at the upcoming guest and a phone number they can use to call in live on the show.

Covering every facet of popular music, Program Host Patrick interviews artists and plays cuts from their albums, EP’s and singles.  He talks with artists from the US, Latin America and sometimes even Europe.  All interviews are in English, although the song lyrics are often Spanish or Spanglish.  

Host Patrick focuses on rising singers and bands, local talent in Lakeside, and artists who are at the cusp of going big time, with the occasional famous guest.  While his specialty is fusion music –Latino/gringo– he plays virtually anything you can dance to from cumbia to hip hop to blues and jazz and rock and even folk and electronica.  He also covers local live music – it’s coming back!– and  the FIMPRO Latin Music Convention in Guadalajara, the Latin Alternative Music Conference in New York, and the Latin Grammys.

On the air for seven years in Los Angeles as Music Friday Live radio, Host Patrick changed the name to Music Sin Fronteras when he moved to Mexico last year and set up a broadcast studio in downtown Ajijic.  He broadcasts every Friday at 1 pm CT on stations in the US and the UK. Semanario Laguna readers will get the broadcast link, the weekly lineup, and the talk line to call in and talk with the artists.

Chapala Expat Liasion Hector nEspana helping families.

Patrick O’Heffernan.- As the Lakeside community begins to up from the quarantine to stop the spread of Covid-19, both Mexicans and Expats are working to help ease the impact on the local families in need, but the help provided by Expat organizations and businesses to the local communities needs to remain strong.  

Among the businesses and organizations who have been “angels” are Operation Feed in San Juan Cosalá, Super La Huerta Market in West Ajijic, which has been providing food despensas, Programa de Niños Incapacitados, Lake Chapala Center, Foodbank Lakeside, and many others.  

Many Expats have donated to these organizations or taken personal responsibility for supporting local individuals they know or who work for them, even when they must stay home. Local restaurants, which are themselves often in a difficult situation, have been feeding families in need. Casa Maybella Test Kitchen and La Bodega are two of the many restaurants that have provided meals to families devastated by the quarantine.

Dispenses packed by volunteers awaiting distribtuion

But the need will not diminish immediately as restaurants and stores open. Chapala Expat Liaison Héctor España points out that and almost every neighborhood in Chapala has families that are stressed for things beside food and that there is a great need in many neighborhoods throughout Lakeside.

The towns of Santa Cruz de la Soledad and San Nicolás de Ibarra have no economic activity  and are especially hard hit.  “The people there need more than food – they need money and medical care and everything required to support families,” he said, noting that “even in Ajijic with many gringos, there are hungry families because people like waiters and dishwashers and cooks have been out of work.”

España himself goes out and delivers despensas and knows of families that have not been helped, so he tries to see to it that they get what they need.  On his Facebook Page he complements the  Expat “angels” who go out on a second round of deliveries with more despensas including visiting families who tell him that they have been missed by all others.  Some “angels” also continue his second round with other families. 

Some families do get government assistance he noted, from the several million pesos the Federal and Jalisco governments allocated for relief and small business help.  But it was far too little for

Delegado Juan Ramon Flores in is office. By Patrick O’Heffernan.

Patrick O’Heffernan. Ajijic. The Plaza and the Malecón are still closed, but the churches are open with sanitary guidelines, along with restaurants and stores throughout Ajijic.  But hotels and galleries, if they are open, see little or no business.  The economy has a long way to go before it is anything like normal, which means that many local families in Ajijic are still on the edge financially and need help. Ajijic Delegado Juan Ramon Flores sat down with Laguna this week to talk about them and what is being done for them

“In the past five weeks we have distributed 5000 dispensas throughout the area, using the money from Chapala”, he said, noting that there were not specific neighborhoods he concentrated on. He and his volunteers look at the conditions of families from week to week to know who to distribute despensas and other help to rather than designate specific neighborhoods because situations change with people.

He divides the city into halves and some volunteers work on one part and some on another part. “We are distributing over 200 despensas for Ajijic every week.  Many people are out of work and need help”, he said, noting that there is no unemployment insurance in Mexico when asked about government assistance to the unemployed.

“I have ten volunteers – not employees – every week who help with the despensas ,” he said, “some are different people each week, some expat some Mexicans.”  He continued that some people in Ajijic have friends in the United States who send money that is used to buy despensas.  

“We all work together,” he said, “the cooperation is excellent, there are many good organizations helping.” He added that expats who want to get involved in helping should contact Héctor España, the Expat Liaison in Chapala. 

When asked about plans for more opening he said that “The Malecon and the Plaza will be the last things to open.  We wait for the word from the Jalisco government about when cases go down. Same with live music. It is their decision. “ 

He added that, except for important trips and volunteering , the people should stay safe at home and wear masks.

The creation of the corn leaf products has been on hold since March.

Miguel Cerna.- “Sin  chamba”  – without work – is how the nearly 200 artisans of San Cristóbal Zapotitlán  describe themselves because they had to stop the production of corn leaf crafts due to the lack of sales when  tourism stopped in March.

 The situation is especially difficult for the artisans like Laura Flores Damasco, who has been working in the corn leaf technique for 20 years and relies on it to support her family. Damasco stopped producing due to the lack of buyers so she resorted to doing household chores with her relatives to survive the pandemic. It will be difficult to start again due to the increase in the cost of the materials she requires to produce the dolls, birth announcements, flowers and other items she makes.

Febronia Leal Arce, 58, also a corn leaf artisan and the head of a family of 10, explained  her plight.  «We are now in this situation because we have no jobs; we don’t even have tortillas, ”she said with resignation. She was echoed by Herlinda Anguiano who runs the “Creaciones San Cristóbal” cooperative of 10 women, who she said now are all out of work.

So far, the only support that this union has received was the delivery of 70 food despensas by the Ministry of Economic Development through the General Directorate of Artisan Development; however, as of our deadline, no support has been announced to restart their work or revitalize their market.

Jesús Carlo Cuevas González, director of Tourism and Crafts of Jocotepec.

This devastating economic blow to corn leaf artisans has been caused by the virtual disappearance of the tourist sector nationwide as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic and the travel bans enacted or urged to combat its spread, as explained by Jesús Carlo Cuevas González, director of Tourism and Crafts of Jocotepec.  Corn leaf crafts had a strong presence in Tonalá, Chapala, Mazamitla and the neighboring state of Michoacán , and at the  Jocotepec pier, which, is still closed due to contingency.

“The corn leaf artisans have no sales  now because their main market is people from Guadalajara or the ZMG, who come to buy their crafts to take home. The issue is that with the paralysis of the tourism sector, there are no people who buy handicrafts because it is not considered an essential item,” he said.

Although not all artisans are heads of the family, most contribute considerably to the livelihood of their homes, so some have chosen to migrate to the countryside in order to restart the production of their crafts. (translated by Patrick O’Heffernan)

RESTAURANT IN THE CENTER OF AJIJIC.

Patrick O’Heffernan. Ajijic – Kicking off the reopening process,  Chapala posted its Comprehensive System for Economic Reactivation (SIRI) on its Facebook page along with a video outlining the steps necessary for businesses to get accredited to open. Among the first to apply and reopen are restaurants.

At the state level, Governor Alfaro anticipates that in this “Phase Zero”, manufacturing industries will open first, followed by agricultural industries.  Chapala is allowing the opening of its 450 restaurants in Phase 0.  The official state plan and required sanitation protocols are to be released by this Thursday but local restaurant owners have already been able to apply.  The plan will include dates for each phase of a sector’s reopening and the “new normal” for operation. 

Tourism is expected to be the last sector to open and a spokesperson for UdeG projected 5 months before tourism is opened, bad news for Chapala and tourist-oriented Ajijic.  But local restaurants are opening so Laguna talked with restaurant owners to get a picture of the reactivation process on the ground.

Pasta Trenta Italian Restaurant owner Barbara Romo reopened Tuesday night with 30% of her tables available and no more than 4 people per table plus following all sanitary protocols…   Look for complete information in the print edition of this newspaper.