October 05, 2007, Cont. from front page, Insurrection in Atotonilco, By Jesús Ibarra

By law and by tradition, the First Lady of the city acts as president of the DIF board. For the past year, Patricia Gutiérrez Rebollo, Mayor Jesús Correa’s wife, has held this post, and she says she is “very thankful to her husband for having given her this opportunity.”

On September 19, González Rebollo gave her first annual report of activities at DIF; on October 3, she repeated her presentation in English for the foreign community, which has supported the work of DIF.

“The Family Services Department is the human face of the local government,” she commented. “It gives support to the most vulnerable members of the population.

This is possible thanks to programs and support offered by the state DIF, which receives some allocations from the federal DIF; to the volunteers; and, above all, to the participants in the programs who are working to benefit themselves, their families and their community.”

The local DIF receives 80 percent of its support from the municipality, 15 percent from the state and federal DIF in the form of goods, and 5 percent from donations.

Four areas of assistance

Within the area of community development, the Mi Casa DIFerente (My DIFferent House) program aims to provide housing for families in urban and rural communities who live in extreme poverty. The program requires that recipients contribute labor operating under the philosophy that participation is part of the solution. In the past year, construction materials were supplied to 85 families.

Legal protection for children and families comes in the form of an interdisciplinary DIF program known as CENAVI (Center for Attention to Violence Against Children), which offers assistance to victims of family violence, including medical care, financial aid and counseling as needed. DIF’s program of nutritional support and education promotes improving the nutrition of those who show signs of malnourishment. Through meetings, talks, culinary demonstrations, nutritional consultation and civic and cultural education, the program seeks to instill healthy eating habits and improve nutrition within the community.

A social assistance program administered by DIF offers counseling and other support programs to help those at risk deal with the emotional and social challenges they face.

Children at DIF daycare

One of the most important social services DIF provides is a daycare center. About 240 children between infancy and five years of age attend the daycare five days a week. “The requirements for children to be accepted are that both parents work, so they are not able to take care of them, and they do not have the resources to pay for a private daycare,” said Gutiérrez Rebollo. “Our daycare is in great demand. The children arrive at 7am and we give them breakfast and lunch, so many people want to bring their children. The meals are prepared with grains and legumes, and we also include soy, which is very nutritious. Parents pay according to their abilities.”

The First Lady said that the main problem facing the daycare is a lack of space. “A lot of children whose parents have applied to enter the DIF daycare are not accepted because we do not have enough space and they have to be put on a waiting list,” said Gutiérrez.

“For me, it is wonderful to see the children smile, to see them so happy. That shows that they are healthy and that they are treated well by DIF staff.”

Children at Casa Esperanza

Another service for children within the DIF is Casa Esperanza, located in a rented house in Colonia San Antonio. “Here, we assist street children in a program called DIM (Integral Development for Children),” said Gutiérrez. “All the children who are selling in the streets, or just begging, wanting to earn money in the easiest way, are invited to come to Casa Esperanza. Sometimes, we think that we are helping them by giving them money, but we are really creating future criminals who will not see the need to work and earn money in an honest way.” She added that social workers identify and encourage the children to participate in the program, but that children are not taken to Casa Esperanza against their wishes.

Patricia Morán, DIF’s assistant director, said that children in Casa Esperanza receive an informal education. “We have children from 5 to 14 years old, and we offer them lessons in an informal way, since most of them do not go to school. Afterwards, DIF searches for an appropriate school where they can continue their formal education, with a scholarship provided by DIF,” explained Morán. “The objective of this program is to integrate the children into the school system.” She recounted three recent examples of children who continued studying after leaving Casa Esperanza; one girl is now a nurse, and two others are in high school. Gutiérrez Rebollo added that the mothers of these children also receive counseling and instruction to help them integrate more fully into social life.

Morán noted that at certain times during the year the number of children selling or begging in the streets of San Miguel increase. “These children are not from San Miguel or the rural communities. They come from other places such as Amealco, in Querétaro, because they know many foreigners, who will give them dollars, are in San Miguel. We cannot bring these children to Casa Esperanza because they are not from here. We are aware of only one rural community in the municipality, Peña Blanca, where it is a kind of tradition for parents to send their children to sell or beg in the streets.”

Gutiérrez Rebollo urged the entire community, including ex-pats and tourists, not to give money to street children. “It is very difficult for us to eradicate this social problem if people continue giving money to them,” she said.

Programs for the elderly

DIF dedicates several of its programs to elderly people. “Many aged people who are begging in the streets have left their families because they do not want to be a burden to them. We invite all these men and women to take advantage of the special activities we have for them,” said Gutiérrez, who explained that these activities include handicraft workshops, occupational therapy, and exercise programs.

The First Lady said that the local DIF has the opportunity to receive one million pesos from the state in order to build a geriatric center. “Although we have activities for aged people in our current facilities, we need more space so that they can do other things, such as farming. To obtain this funding from the state DIF, we must have land for the project and match their contribution, so we are left with the problem of inadequate resources. It would be great if at least someone would donate the land.”

One of the activities DIF organizes for the elderly is called “Grandma’s Recipe.” In this program, women from rural communities cook nutritious meals using food provided by DIF, mostly grains and soy. “It is a way to rescue the old cooking tradition from the rural communities and add nutrition at a very low cost,” said Gutiérrez. The main ingredients used by the women for their cooking are soy, nopales, zucchini flowers (flor de calabaza), and prickly pear (tuna).

Breakfast in rural communities

Besides the provisions DIF offers to elderly people, it also provides hot breakfasts for children in rural communities. “People pay one peso for each breakfast,” explained Gabriela Bibriesca, DIF’s director. “It is important that they learn that it is not completely free—that everything has a cost. We use this small amount to help offset our costs and enlarge the program. The mothers themselves cook the breakfasts.”

A civic organization, Feed the Hungry, also provides breakfast to people in some rural communities, but Gutiérrez Rebollo and Bibriesca explained that DIF does not have programs in the communities where Feed the Hungry offers breakfast. “Feed the Hungry helps us a lot with this work, because there are more than 500 communities in the municipality and we do not have the enough resources to provide for them all. We work well together.” However, Bibriesca and Gutiérrez said that because Feed the Hungry offers its breakfasts without charge some communities are not keen to accept DIF’s breakfast program. “It is important that people understand that the government will not give them everything for free—they have to collaborate for their own benefit. It works better if we teach them to work with us as a team,” said Bibriesca.

Mi Casa DIFerente

Guitiérrez Rebollo explained that the objective of Mi Casa DIFerente is to help families who live in extreme poverty and whose houses are built of unsafe and inadequate materials. “We have benefited eight communities with this program, and the foreign community has greatly supported us, for which we are very thankful,” said Guitiérrez, who explained that DIF provides the materials and the beneficiaries build their houses themselves. “We help them, but we also ask them to collaborate. The main material with which these houses are built is love.”

“We have a lot of projects, but also a lot of needs, mainly economic. But with God’s help and the support of the citizens, including the foreign community, we will keep helping those who need it,” said the First Lady. She announced that on Friday 26 October a benefit dinner will be held to help support the Mi Casa DIFerente program.

Don Maximiliano González, 71, promotes DIF programs for the elderly in the rural community of La Cuadrilla. He is very thankful to DIF for having helped him and his family, since he can no longer work.

When he was young he was a campesino. His wife is bedridden; his daughter has diabetes and his son is mentally disabled.

“Thanks to the government and to DIF, I can continue living. I am the only support for my family, although I am old and sick. I head a group of 14 elderly people who clean up our community every Friday. I always tell the people: “Work hard and you will see how the DIF and the government will help us.”

55 Mi Casa DIFerente houses in eight different communities; 30 more are under construction

542,800 breakfasts

114,516 people received 6,516 provision rations in 46 different rural communities

1,200 provision rations to vulnerable and handicapped people

400 liters of milk were donated to ALMA

720 liters of milk were donated to Casa Hogar Mexiquito

720 liters of milk were donated to Casa Hogar Los Ángeles

107 vouchers for medication

1,155 people received free medicine; 4,622 received medicine at reduced cost

10 wheelchairs

457 elderly people received clothing and 200 blankets during the winter of 2006; 500 additional blankets and shawls were also distributed

294 children took part in Casa Esperanza’s DIM program

96 children received scholarships totaling 229,680 pesos

Insurrection in Atotonilco
By Jesús Ibarra

Over 100 women and children blocked the main entrance to Atotonilco on Thursday, September 20. They did not want Public Works Department machines to continue developing a market from the park and soccer court at the entrance to the historic rural community. The site, about 300 meters from the church, would relocate more than 400 vendors who currently sell religious items on the streets at the shrine’s entrance every weekend. The vendors are not only from Atotonilco, but from San Miguel and elsewhere.

Mayor Jesús Correa and City Council Secretary Cristóbal Finkelstein Franyutti said the relocation is needed to avoid crowding and to prevent accidents. The historical church is part of the nomination—along with San Miguel—for the UNESCO World Heritage list.

“The street is public and it cannot be held hostage by just a few. We, as the authority, have the obligation to protect it and to keep it open for everyone,” said Finkelstein.

The police report said 86 officers, headed by Police Chief Daniel Trujillo, went to Atotonilco to solve the problem. According to the report the women protestors greeted the police contingency with threats and insults—one even threatened to burn the police cars.

Josefina Ramírez Mejía, one of the demonstrators, said they want to prevent the only green area in the community from becoming a tianguis (market). “If the vendors are relocated to this area, our children will not have a place to play,” said Ramírez Mejía. “I myself am a vendor and I would even sacrifice my business in order to protect our only green area.” She said the police destroyed trees the neighbors had just planted around the area. “They even threatened us with tear gas. If it were not for the federal preventive police, they would have thrown the gas.”

Finkelstein said, “When I learned that the Atotonilco road had been blocked, I called the federal preventive police since it is a federal area, to ask for their help to control the situation. This response was according to law. The police force exists to keep order. These vendors have used land which was not theirs. This area was donated to the municipality 11 years ago, in payment for a housing development—local law requires that developers must donate land for public use. The donation document establishes that it can be used either as a green area or as a tianguis or market, whatever are the needs of the community. The City Council voted that the vendors must be relocated, since the street is for everybody.”

The city secretary explained that the “soccer field” is not really a green area; in 11 years, not a single tree has been planted. “Yet, the day we begin work, they plant trees,” he said. “Now they are using the green area as a pretext for not moving. We are even providing them with another green area 800 meters from the land in question. Most of the community agreed to move; it is only one group who refuse. When Mayor Correa learned about this, he ordered me to stop the works in order to have more talks and try to reach an agreement with the nonconformist neighbors.”

Other issues that worry the Atotonilco neighbors are that property values may increase with the World Heritage designation, thus affecting the future use of public areas next to the shrine.

“If property values increase, the housing tax will increase for sure,” said Ramírez Mejía and her companion José de Jesús Licea Ramírez. “We do not want to see businesses from other people, rich people, foreign to the community, established in the areas next to the shrine. It would be unfair to move us away to let other people come and put in elegant businesses.”

Finkelstein said that use of land given to Atotonilco will be established by the urban development plan, made according to the study performed by architect and historian Guadalupe Horta (one of the experts hired to do the micro-region analysis, see Atención, September 21). Finkelstein said, “The object of this plan will be to create a sustainable development for the benefit of all members of the community. Any authorization to change in land use in Atotonilco would be to the benefit of the entire community.” He said that housing tax increases are regulated by the state income law, and are dependent on the property, size, constructed area and condition. “Property taxes have nothing to do with World Heritage listing,” he said.

Ramírez Mejía and Licea Ramírez said that neighbors have proposed another site for relocation, which is just behind the church. “We do not know who the owner is,” they said.

Finkelstein said experts from the Public Services and Urban Development departments are now measuring and analyzing the land to determine how many vendors might fit there. “It is a small place, and part of it is private property. However, we continue analyzing the proposal, by the mayor’s orders.”