JUNE 2009

Santiago has the potential to draw tourists of the Northern Coast

Santiago has the potential to draw tourists of the Northern CoastEco tourist project

BREAKING NEWS: The secretary of Tourism, Francisco Javier García, recognized the conditions which meets the Cibao for a eco tourist project which could draw the visitors who arrive on the Northern coast.

During the inauguration of the Expoturismo 2009 Santiago Fair, he informed that he will carry out a strategic planning to develop a eco tourist project in this metropolis, with an attraction centre for the tourists who visit the Northern coast and the North-East of the Dominican Republic .

The civil servant said that this city laid out of a great potential of economic and social development which has to be known by the foreigners who come to the country in the tourist poles.

As secretariat of Tourism, we must take part and offer our support, this is why we will sign agreements with the hotel chains in order that buses full of tourists arrive to Santiago, the civil servant ensured.

He supported that this city had strategically a great advantage because it is in the middle of the country; therefore he considers that it is important to draw up the plan of all the public tourist events, in order to draw the attention of the fourteen provinces of the Cibao.

This city is not only the economic center of all the area but has characteristics which make that we can direct tourists there and thus benefit from his potential to carry out a eco tourist project, he added.

García ensured that Santiago don’t have nothing to envy to any city of the world.

More than 80 companies of the tourist sector, hotels, cruising and air lines attend the Expoturismo 2009 Fair.

Santiago Live, 08.06.09

Credits for more than 5 billion pesos in Santiago

Credits for more than 5 billion pesos in SantiagoBanreservas inaugurates a new office in Ulloa Centro Plaza

BREAKING NEWS: SANTIAGO. - The Bank of Reservas lent for more than 5 billion 449 million pesos to finance various consumer activities, businesses and industries of this city, equivalent to 27% of the total spent by the local Multiple Bank, affirmed Daniel Toribio, general administrator of the financial institution.

Toribio explained that the reserves in May of this year were of 10 billion 42 million, equivalent to 33% of the total obtained by the Multiple Bank in the province of the Cibao.

During the inauguration of the office in Ulloa Centro Plaza, in the sector La Fuente, the civil servant supported that the trade of the neighborhoods like industries, hardware, supermarkets, universities, gas stations and pharmacies could count on an ally with Banreservas.

He explained that the new office of Banreservas is located within a dynamic commercial place in continuous growth.

Toribio explained that the trades and other customers of the institutions located in the surroundings represented an important source of businesses for Banreservas, this is why he considered important to reinforce the relations with these sectors, to support new banking services and to extend those already existing.

Santiago Live, 18.06.09

A 3.5 quake shakes Santiago

A 3.5 quake shakes SantiagoSecond small earthquake felt in the area

BREAKING NEWS: SANTIAGO. -An earthquake registering 3.5 on the Richter scale was felt in Santiago and other locations in the north of the Dominican Republic on Monday afternoon. The data analyst at the Seismological Institute at the Autonomous University of Santo Domingo (UASD), Felix Martinez said that the quake occurred at a depth of 22 kilometers and at 19.4 degrees North and 70.6 degrees West longitude.

The seismic movement was registered at 22:15 GMT (6:15 local) according to the Emergency Operations Committee (COE) and Civil Defense.

The regional director for both organizations, Francisco Arias, told El Nuevo Diario that there were no reports of injuries or other damage as a result of the earthquake.
This is the second small earthquake that has been felt in the area in less than a month.

According to Orlando Franco, a prominent Civil Engineer and student of Geology, these movements are part of an area of great seismic activity that surrounds a fault line located in the Septentrional Mountains (Northern) and which includes the provinces of Santiago, Puerto Plata, Valverde (Mao), Salcedo and Duarte.

DR1, 23.06.09

Five deaths because of the rains

Five deaths because of the rains600 displaced persons and 170 flooded houses

BREAKING NEWS: The number of died people because of the rains in Santiago is rising to five, with the discovery on Tuesday of the corpse of a man who disappeared on Monday after being swept away by the water of a rising river whereas he tried to cross it by horse.

The rains which for 15 days have fallen over the North of the country, had already caused the death of a 7 year-old child struck down by a flash in the province of Espaillat and of a 18 year- old boy who drowned while trying to cross a river in Puerto Plata.

Moreover, two other people died after having been swept away by a river in the commune of Bonao, in the North.

Arias, sub director of the Civil Defense for the Northern area, explained that in the commune of Villa González, 170 houses were flooded and that another was partially destroyed, while in Santiago, at least 11 residences collapsed because of the downpours.

100 other residences were flooded in the sectors of Quinigua, la Otra Banda, Villa Liberación, los Salados, Platanitos, Las Mercedes, La Javilla and Hoyo de Bartola.

The person in charge of the aid organization informed that at least 600 people were moved in the commune of Villa González, because of the overflow of the Arenquillo River.

The administrator of the Economic Restaurants, Nicolás Calderón, following the instructions of President Leonel Fernández, designated a commission to accelerate the food distribution to all the people who were moved. He informed that the families are receiving lunch and dinner.

In the same way, the Secretariat of Public Work is evaluating the damage caused to the bridge which connects the communities of Breña with Vanegas, whose collapse does not allow any more the traffic of the vehicles in the zone.

Santiago Live, 24.06.09

Houses will be rented for the floods’ victims

Santiago de los CaballerosAffected sector of Los Guandules

BREAKING NEWS: The Presidency of the Republic through the governor of the province of Santiago, professor José Izquierdo, gave resources to pay the rent of residences for 74 families victim of the bad weather in the sector of Los Gandules.

The representative of the Executive Branch affirms that the people for whom these resources were intended will be installed thereafter in residences which will be built by the government of Colombia, through an agreement between the two States.

Izquierdo indicates that in the sector of Los Guandules, many families remained and that the authorities had to declare the place as Public Danger because of the high degree of risk present in the zone and because of the quantity of landslides caused by the last rains in Santiago.

The civil servant explains that the sector of Los Guandules will be under the supervision to the Secretariat of Environment so that one prevents in this zone the construction of new residences.

He pointed out after the collapse of the 74 small houses, President Fernández went on the spot and that after having evaluated the situation in which the refugees of Los Guandules were, he ordered to the provincial governor to manage as soon as possible the rent of new residences and to build other new houses for the families who are still in the risk of the same sector.

With regard to the affected families of Carlos Díaz de Tamboril, the representative of the Executive branch said that the government was in a negotiation process with the owners of the lands where the future residences will be built.

Santiago Live, 30.06.09