The national emergency commission has selected a contractor to pick up the garbage in the Cantón de Tibás for six months. The firm is WWP, the trash hauler, and the contract went into effect Monday.

Tibás has been buried in garbage during a dispute of several years over municipal finances. Trash bags are stacked high in vacant lots. They are 10 deep along the canton’s roads. Smart residents are smuggling their trash into San José for municipal pickup there.

The Comisión Nacional de la Comisión Nacional de Prevención de Riesgos y Atención de Emergencias will be investing 148 million colons, some $287,000. Commission President Daniel Gallardo said the accumulated garbage will be picked up in 15 days and then the company will maintain normal pickups.

The six months will give the municipality time to get its finances in order, he said.

The commission acted May 23 to end what it considered a health menace. The trash and plastic bags created pockets of water where dengue-bearing mosquitoes could breed. There also was an increase in rats.

The Ministerio de Salud termed the situation an immediate danger, not only for Tibás but for the capital to the south. It took two months to accept bids and get the proposed contract approved.

Ticos around the northwestern Guanacaste province this week are celebrating the province’s decision to secede from Nicaragua and become part of Costa Rica in 1824.

Though today is the official anniversary of the day the province was annexed, the Annexation of Guanacaste Day national holiday was moved to July 31 because of a May 2005 law stating that when the holiday falls on a Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday or Friday, it will be celebrated on the Monday of the following week (TT, July 21).

Domingo Arias, a citizen from Guanacaste’s Nicoya peninsula, argued before the Constitutional Chamber of the Supreme Court (Sala IV) earlier this month that changing the holiday from its traditional July 25 date is unconstitutional, according to the daily La Nación.

“Some things can be played with and others can’t. There was blood shed here, and important decisions were made by our ancestors,” Arias, a farmer and owner of a tourism business, told La Nación.

The court is studying Arias’ complaint but has not made any decision to change the May 2005 ruling, Sala IV spokesman Marcelino Silva told The Tico Times.

Citizens in Liberia, the capital of the Guanacaste province, are celebrating the holiday this week with a Livestock Fair and Exposition organized by the Chamber of Livestock Owners, which will run through July 31. The fair featured horse shows and bull fights over the weekend; a rodeo will be held Thursday, archery competitions will take place Saturday and Sunday and the Guanacaste National Band will conclude the festivities July 31.

-Tico Times

By Adam Foxman, Tico Times Staff

The Simón Bolívar Zoo in San José’s Barrio Amón celebrated its 90 th anniversary yesterday with music, candles and reconciliation.

Elementary and high school students who won a singing contest called “What Falls in the River Ends up in the Sea” provided entertainment at the morning celebration, which culminated with representatives of the nonprofit Foundation for Zoos (FUNDAZOO), which runs the facility, singing happy birthday to the zoo alongside Vice-Minister of Environment and Energy Jorge Rodríguez.

The participation of the Ministry of Environment and Energy (MINAE) in the event marked a change in the government’s tumultuous relationship with FUNDAZOO, which has been sharply criticized for the facility’s cramped cages and allegedly unsanitary conditions.

During the last administration, a fierce legal battle erupted between the company and MINAE after the ministry tried to regain control of the public zoo (TT, Jan. 28, 2005).

Now, the ministry wants to work together with FUNDAZOO to improve conditions for the zoo’s animals, Rodríguez explained.

“The country is not going to gain anything if we keep fighting,” said Rodríguez, explaining that studies are under way as to how to best improve the zoo and fix its financial problems.

MINAE and FUNDAZOO are resolving their differences and there is “good will” between them, agreed Yolanda Matamoros, president of FUNDAZOO.