Ozama, the river that no one wants

December 22, 2009

By Luis Jose Chavez
The author is a journalist and political scientist

In many cities of the world's rivers are not only an important ecological heritage and tourism resource of unquestionable value, but also a symbol of cultural identity, like the Rio La Plata in Buenos Aires, Paris the Seine, the Thames in London , the Rhine in Germany and other European countries and the extensive river Danube who also plays many cities of the continent.

In Santo Domingo, the Rio Ozama is simply a sewer, a deposit of scrap and a problem that many authorities prefer to simply ignore.

All efforts to formally outlined and started to rescue the Ozama have thinned without generating any meaningful solution, either by lack of political will by the authorities or by the absence of plans and resources to address the problem from a holistic perspective.

The Coordinated Interagency Action Plan for Re-Structuring Social-Economic, and Ecological Urban slums bordering the rivers Ozama and Isabela in Santo Domingo (RESURE Plan) designed in the first term of Leonel Fernandez , passed unnoticed and without leaving any trace, but was included in the overall urban solutions provided in the original draft of the Santo Domingo Metro. The Metro Plan RESURE happened but stayed.

The company responsible for the Sans Souci tourist project has removed hundreds of tons of scrap and waste in its area of operations, but the causes of pollution of the river, they have to do with the environment, remain unchanged.

Recent initiatives announced by the Commonwealth of Greater Santo Domingo, under the leadership of Mayor Roberto Salcedo Gavilan, have gone from simple operations to justify some headlines.

On the eastern side the situation is no less grim. Juan De Los Santos seems to have decided not to look there. In his nearly four years at the municipality of Santo Domingo De Los Santos has not done anything to address the very serious health problem representing several creeks that empty into the Rio Ozama, including the call Cañada del Diablo, which crosses several marginalized Villa Duarte.

But the Syndic De Los Santos has not only brought the body to the Cañada del Diablo, but also the whole area of influence of the Ozama River, where the closure is too obvious, like Julian Barcelo Avenue, designed as a kind of boardwalk to the Villa Duarte and the Ozama.

This avenue has become an open dump, where trash and construction debris have occupied the promenade and a good deal of space for vehicle circulation.

In the past, these issues would probably have provoked the interest of the media, but are now part of everyday life and therefore are no longer news.