by Rod Hughes
One might say that police vigilance is not exactly fierce in the tiny rural village of Quebrada Ganado, near Tarcoles. The town, of slightly more than 2,000 population, has a station house, but no resident policeman to put in it.
But the last straw fell when drug addicts and alcoholics took over the rundown law enforcement post, residents complained to the daily newspaper La Nacion.
Local businessman Carlos Chaves described the level of cop’s attention to the paper this way, “Once in a while a policeman will come on a motorcycle, turn around and go off again. We need a permanent cop here.”
The director of the local school, Lisbeth Mora, complains that some of her 323 students are often bothered by alcoholics and drug-addled persons as the students go and come from school. “This concerns our teachers and parents,” she said.
Regional police chief Mario Calderon says he’s doing the best he can by sending a policeman to the village when he can. “Everybody knows our lack of personnel,” he said.

by Rod Hughes
NICOYA, GTE.—Good news came from the Ministry of Transport and Public Works (MOPT, its Spanish acronym) today, answering the dearest hopes and dreams of residents, farmers and tourists in the Northwestern province of Guanacaste: MOPT will send road repair equipment to be spotted in strategic locations around the province for ready repair of the–until now—wretched road system.
The state of Guanacaste roads is the most frequently-mentioned criticism in hotel guest book comments, but other benefits from more frequent road work will be felt by farmers whose trucks will need far fewer repairs and even in real estate values. Rampant real estate development is, indeed, one of the most important factors in the roads’ deterioration as trucks carrying construction supplies have increased traffic several fold.
Nor will the province have to wait long for the pilot plan to be put in play—the Comptroller General’s office, the government’s contracting watchdog agency, has cleared the way for direct contracting of repair work, cutting several miles of red tape by the decision.
Work could start as early as July, Minister Karla Gonzalez told the daily paper La Nacion last week. “With the purchase of new equipment, MOPT will have what it needs to give the roads continuous repair,” she said, “The roads will always have the presence of our equipment and we’ll save time in being able to resurface them.”
The new equipment will include trucks, backhoes, graders and loaders, Gonzalez said. MOPT will cut downtime (an Aquilles heel in Costa Rica where periodic maintenance in the past has not been a prime priority of MOPT) by contracting companies to journey to the province to provide repairs to the far-flung machinery.

by Rod Hughes
The United States won its fourth Gold Cup soccer tourney yesterday in a bangup game of suspense and movement, defeating Mexico 2-1.
The organizers, CONCACAF, got what they wanted (some would say engineered) in Chicago—a packed stadium of rabid fans cheering two popular teams. The spectators got a fine game of thrills and—wonder of wonders—competent officiating.
Mexico had an edge in ball play the first half, including a superb goal by Mexico’s Andres Guardado at minute 44 to go into the second half leading. Indeed, it appeared the second half might be a duplicate of the first, but the U.S. side got back into their stride of earlier in the tournament.
The ever-cool, confident U.S. striker Landon Donovan blasted in a penalty kick at minute 61 for the tying goal. At least he appeared cool and confident when he hunkered down to study the goal before his kick, as if preparing a long putt in a championship golf tourney. But afterward, during the manditory celebration, he ostentatiously mopped his brow!
But the real shocker was when the U.S. was repulsed at the goal and had to retreat at minute 73. U.S. midfielder Benny Feilhaber took the ball kicked back to him—and fed it on a blast into the goal mouth from away from the goalmouth. Way away, if you’ll pardon the redundancy.
But the description of the goals hardly can do justice to this game. How about Donovan’s long drive, dribbling alone nearly the whole length of the pitch, only to hit the righthand upright of the goal. If his toe had touched the ball a little more to the right, they’s still be replaying it on TV.
Then, there was the near-tying shot by Mexico’s Adolfo Batutista with a minute left. He found the ball loose at the goalmouth but goalie Tim Howard’s feline reactions saved the U.S. win.
The Mexican side was also hampered by losing Jared Borgetti at minute 40 due to injury. And we must not end this without mentioning the fine, steady play throughout the tourney from Mexico’s Alberto Medina and Pavel Pardo.
The fine sports spectacle was directed by two coaches making their first debuts in international play: Bob Bradley for the U.S. and Hugo Sanchez for Mexico. Despite early criticism by the voracious Mexican press, both coaches should be proud of their teams’ performances.