Costa Rica's Oscar Arias Administration Pulling Down Hotels

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You read it right here. The Oscar Arias administration has actually been applying the Maritime Laws that forbid construction within 50 meters of the high tide mark. The law was blatantly disregarded for decades, during which scores of hotels and private homes went up along, abutting, and sometimes even atop the beaches. Money clearly changed hands surreptitiously in many cases, while in other cases, Costa Ricans' family connections helped pull strings to ensure that officials of the Ministry of the Environment and Energy (MINAE) turned a blind eye. And the entire application of the Maritime Law was considered a joke.

What a shock I had last year to discover that many buildings along the beachfront in Playas del Coco, Brasilito (Nicoya), Manuel Antonio, and elsewhere had been torn down. It seems Oscar Arias means business.

And last month MINAE's bulldozers arrived to tear down the Las Palmas Hotel and Hotel Suerre in Punta Uva, on the Caribbean coast, near Puerto Viejo. The hotels, which were built two decades ago, are located within the Gandoca-Manzanillo National Wildlife Refuge. MINAE reports that they are responsible for ecological damage. The owners, however, obtained a Supreme Court injunction to suspend the demolition. Attempts to close the hotels down have been on-going for almost a decade, resulting in habeas corpus writes, lawsuits, and at least 11 injunctions that have delayed a demolition that was first ordered in 2001.