Construction on the sewage treatment plant for the village has come to a halt. For over 10 years a functional sewage treatment plant in Santa Cruz has eluded us for many reasons including problematic designs, lack of maintenance and support, politics. Black water continues to flow into Lake Atitlan from Santa Cruz!
The Santa Cruz por el Lago group has determined that individual composting toilets - Eco-baños - are the solution for Santa Cruz village. Already eco-baños are being utilized in Tzununa and San Marcos It is imperative for the health of Lake Atitlán that we stop the flow of black water into it NOW.
The Alcalde and the Corporation have indicated that they will submit a proposal to the government for funding of the project IF it can be shown that the community is behind it. They are requiring that at least 100 village families sign up for them first. Quite a few have already signed up, but more are needed.
SCPL is asking that you talk with your guardians and workers and urge them to sign up for an eco-baño. This is time sensitive. There will be a meeting in the village at the municipal salon on Sunday, March 13 at 5:30 p.m. informing the people about the baños and how they work and asking that they sign up. People will not have to pay anything to have a eco-baño, but they will be required to provide labor (working with an albañil). Walls of the eco-baños will be built with eco-ladrillos - plastic bottles filled with plastic trash - which also helps to reduce the problem of plastic trash in our community.
You can read more about Eco-baños, how they are constructed and work in the Amigos de Santa Cruz newsletter, page 5:
http://www.amigosdesantacruz.org/Amigos_de_Santa_Cruz/HOME_files/newsletter%202010.pdf
PLEASE, talk to your workers TODAY!
Atitlan Arts Center - Friday, March 11, 5 p.m.
Open Mike Happy Hour. Read anything (yours or someone else's), play music. Whatever! BYOB and snacks.
Santa Cruz Blog Email Delivery - IMPORTANT
Soon I will be using the new Santa Cruz Blog to replace these email announcements. I hope to be making a weekly blog entry which will have announcements of that week's events and other timely items of interest including the publication of The Cruz News. The Blog will be used only for announcements, not personal opinion, and will come out only once a week.
Previously, one could only sign up for the Blog as an RSS feed, but I now have a way that you can sign up for automatic email delivery of the Santa Cruz Blog. Go to this page - http://santacruzlalaguna.weebly.com/blog.html
Then scroll down on the right-hand column to where it says:
**Click here to Subscribe to Santa Cruz la Laguna Cruz News - Blog by Email
Click on that sentence and an email subscription form will appear for you to fill out. You must sign up for the Blog or you will not receive notification of The Cruz News or other announcements of interest. You can deactivate your subscription at any time.
Printing The Cruz News
Some people have had trouble figuring out how to print The Cruz News from the website. There are now instructions on the best way to do this on The Cruz News page: http://santacruzlalaguna.weebly.com/current-cruz-news.html
Thanks to all,
Cynthia