‘I’m more concerned about going to Chicago’: Cartel violence isn’t scaring Americans away from Los Cabos – By Alfredo Corchado (dallasmorningnews.com) / March 11 2018
LOS CABOS, Mexico — Joel Boschee heard the warnings to stay away from his favorite vacation spot. He saw the headlines describing an explosion of violence.
At the urging of family members, he and his wife toyed with the idea of spending their leisure time in another exotic spot. They tried Hawaii.
In the end, the elegance of Los Cabos, its raw desert beauty surrounded by glistening Pacific and Sea of Cortez waters, lured them back.
Mexico says Playa del Carmen is safe despite U.S. security alert, consulate’s closure
The Boschees say they felt safer here than in some U.S. cities.
“I’m more concerned about going to Chicago than Cabo because I hear there’s someone killed every day there,” said Boschee, of South Dakota. “We’ve never run into any problems. It’s always been friendly and fun. A nice place to visit.”
As spring break begins for many Texans next week, Mexico remains the top destination for American tourists. In 2017, 85 percent of Mexico’s 35 million international visitors came from the U.S., according to Mexico’s tourism secretary.
For many, sunbathing on beaches against a backdrop of violence is becoming the new normal. Last year, the state of Baja California Sur’s murder rate ranked third in Mexico trailed only the coastal states Colima and Guerrero.
The spike in violence, due to rival drug cartels warring over distribution routes, has left gruesome scenes of bodies hanging from overpasses and, in at least one instance, a fatal shooting of an alleged rival cartel member on a beach in Cabo. The mayhem comes as Los Cabos, a favorite destination for North Texans, set new tourism records in 2017, with 2 million visitors, up about 20 percent in 2016. Daily, there are several nonstop flights from Texas, including three from Dallas Fort Worth International Airport.
This week, the State Department warned of a security threat in the popular destination of Playa del Carmen, in the southern state of Quintana Roo on the Caribbean coast. Two weeks ago, a tourist ferry exploded, injuring 26 people, including five U.S. citizens. Explosives were found on a second ferry last week. The Mexican government is investigating both incidents.
“Security is our priority, and we’re not taking any chances, certainly not dropping our guard,” said Rodrigo Esponda, managing director of the Los Cabos Tourism Board. “We’re doubling our efforts to make sure tourists not only enjoy their visit, but feel safe at all times.”
Steps to boost security
More than 90 percent of the local economy depends on tourism, Esponda said, adding that the government and civic leaders are taking a number of steps to boost security. Those steps include increasing the military’s presence, a tactic that has proven controversial in other cities, including Ciudad Juarez and Tijuana.
Esponda and other business leaders, including the National Chamber of the Restaurant Industry, CANIRAC, approved a five-point, $47 million private-public partnership to shore up security.
The plan, currently underway, includes building a new base for Marines and adding more than 200 surveillance cameras across the small state of Baja California Sur. Additionally, all restaurant workers, valet parking attendants and hostesses must wear a special uniform to help tourists identify them.
“This is a way for the industry to best secure the safety of our tourists and for us to have more control over the main tourism area,” said Gianmarco Vela, managing director of Sunset Monalisa restaurant and vice president of the restaurant chamber.
Most tourists interviewed said they remain unaware of the clashes between cartels. Few have experienced it firsthand because they’re usually shielded at high-end exclusive hotels or all-inclusive resorts where they rarely leave the premises.
“I don’t feel any danger at all,” said Wendy Steinberg. She was on a working trip from Washington, D.C. “I’m just whale watching. How dangerous is that?”
These days tourists walk the streets alongside about 1,500 state and federal police as well as Marines.
“At first it was a bit intimidating,” Benjamin Hicks of Houston said of the increased security. “But then you don’t notice them anymore. It all kind of blends in. I feel very safe.”
‘The golden hen’
That’s not surprising, said Jaime Arredondo, a crime expert at the University of Arizona. Drug traffickers, he said, follow a timeless rule: “You don’t kill the golden hen.”
A prime winter and spring break destination for Americans, the region of an estimated 285,000 actually consists of two separate towns at the southern tip of the Baja Peninsula — San Jose del Cabo and Cabo San Lucas.
The pristine waters are famous for fishing, surfing and whale watching, which this year runs through late April. The area also is home to stunning golf courses, and the distinctive El Arco (Arch) de Cabo San Lucas, a rocky ocean that meets the Sea of Cortez at what’s known as Land’s’ End.
For years, Baja California Sur was considered one of the safest states in Mexico. While cartels have long operated here and in nearby La Paz, the state capital, they quietly coexisted with tourists. Many experts credit that stability to drug trafficker Joaquin “Chapo” Guzman, who generally favored profits over headlines.
Once he was captured and extradited to the U.S., war erupted within the Sinaloa cartel, as the upstart and hyper-violent Jalisco New Generation Cartel became one of the country’s most powerful gangs. With the growing legalization of marijuana in the U.S., cartels are now pushing meth and heroin, according to Laura Y. Calderon, author of a report for the Justice in Mexico Project at the University of San Diego.
The report shows a dramatic increase in the number of homicides in the state. From 2016 to 2017, the number of intentional homicides rose from 192 to 560, a net increase of 192 percent. The state’s homicide rate spiked from 24 to 75 per 100,000 inhabitants, according to the report.
By comparison, Dallas’ homicide rate in 2017 was about 6.3 per 100,000.
‘Definition of insanity’
Security experts warn that flooding cities with military forces, as Tijuana, Ciudad Juarez and Nuevo Laredo have done, breeds more violence. In fact, said David Shirk, director of the Justice in Mexico Project: “They’ve become the armchair definition of insanity: continuing to do the same thing over and over without any change in the result.”
Like other Mexican resorts, Los Cabos was caught unprepared when the violence exploded, Esponda conceded. Police were untrained and so poorly paid some didn’t own their uniforms or guns. Many were in cahoots with criminals.
In January, the State Department restructured its travel advisory system to feature four warning tiers. Advisories range from “Exercise Normal Precautions” (Level 1) to “Do Not Travel (Level 4). Baja California Sur’s current advisory is listed as “Exercise Increased Caution” (Level 2), the same as the advisory for the entire nation. In February, U.S. Ambassador Roberta Jacobson visited Cabo and shared photos and video on her social media, helping promote the region, Esponda said. He said violent crime is down by about 90 percent from a year ago.
The revamped advisory, Jacobson’s visit and latest crime figures “definitely help us,” Esponda said. “It’s a step in the right direction, but we’re not completely satisfied, and won’t be until security is no longer an issue.”
