TIJUANA Think the Occupy Wall Street activists have been protesting a long time?
A group of Tijuana activists camped out for 20 months in green areas outside of city offices to protest a plan to remove 940 trees from a nearby park as part of a sweeping $100 million civic project envisioned to remake central Tijuana.
That protest ended abruptly at dawn Wednesday, when authorities dismantled the camp and removed 22 people.
On Thursday, an estimated 300 people demonstrated noisily outside City Hall, protesting the project, called Zócalo 11 de Julio, and the removal of the encampment.
The demonstrators shouted slogans against the government and the project and demanded that the campers' belongings, confiscated during the raid, be returned. One sign read "Dump the government rats" and had a drawing of a rat with the name of the governor on it.
The controversial project would add public plazas, green space, a library and commercial areas to the city's central area. It's backed by a board made up of business leaders, civic organizations and city and state governments. Board members have reiterated that only about 20 trees will be cut down as part of the project while 2,500 more will be planted.
At dawn Wednesday, city and state authorities raided the camp, which was in the vicinity of Benito Juárez Park, maintaining that the protesters were violating several laws.
The raid came ten days after Tijuana Mayor Carlos Bustamante and Baja California Gov. José Guadalupe Osuna, as well as Zócalo board members, announced that the project was "a dream of Tijuana residents" and that bids would be sought this week for work on the plaza.
In a statement, authorities said that the campers were putting their safety and that of others at risk because they set up gas stoves and microwave ovens and were stealing electrical power. Further, they maintained that the demonstrators would hinder an evacuation of city hall offices in an emergency.
The mayor, for his part, said that local government officials had tried to talk with the project's opponents for two years but that they had refused.
The authorities removed 22 adults from the camp and seized four gas stoves, tents, plastic tables and chairs, blankets, clothes and household items.
Juana Hernández Marroquín, 73, a member of the citizens' group that opposes the project, said she doesn't oppose the Zócalo project on political grounds rather "it's a fight for the Earth and the trees, for the oxygen of this city."
Alberto Plasencia, 57, another opponent, stressed his group is advocating that the project be built on top of the existing park or at a more appropriate spot.
"There are many places that are optimal to construct this project, like the east side, where the greatest proportion of the city's population lives," said Plasencia.
The plaza project has a cost $100 million, of which 63 per cent is to be covered by the private sector and the rest from federal funds designated for urban renewal, according to Carolina Aubanel, president of the board backing it.
The plan calls for the construction of a plaza across 10 acres in the area between the city and state buildings that covers Benito Juárez Park and part of the Río Tijuana canal.
The project includes the plaza, which is to have a capacity to hold 35,000 people, an 11-story building, a three-level parking structure for 2,700 vehicles and a 28,000 square-foot main stage.
There will also be a new building to house the Cultural Institute of Baja California, smaller plazas, business areas and new roads to the Cultural Center, Plaza Río shopping center and colonia Libertad.
The project will provide a public space that the city lacks, said Enrique Mier, treasurer of the board backing it, and give the city a new identity.
Construction is expected to take four years. The first phase began last November, when work started on an underground parking structure on the site of the old City Hall concourse.
Omar.millan@sandiegored.com
