Rumors of our kidnapping and beheading by a Mexican drug cartel have been greatly exaggerated. We, like thousands of other U. S. citizens living in Mexico, exist in peace and harmony with our neighbors.
We are now enjoying our third year in Ensenada, Baja California; some 70 miles south of the dreaded, notorious border city of Tijuana. About 10 times a year we travel the well-maintained and well-patrolled coastal toll road North through Rosarito Beach and Playas de Tijuana to the City of Tijuana and the San Ysidro border crossing. We have no reason to drive in fear of the lawlessness reported in the U.S. media. Chances of our home being robbed are no greater than they were in the U.S.
It has not always been peaceful. From 2006 through part of 2008 there was plenty of violence in Rosarito Beach as well as Tijuana. While the vast majority of us saw no evidence of it, police chiefs as well as rank and file policemen were assassinated with impunity: the chiefs for their hard line against the cartels; the policemen for wanting too much bribe money from the cartels. There were carjackings and kidnappings along the toll road near Rosarito as well. In 2008, however, the Mexican Army moved in to secure the area.
Playas de Tijuana and Rosarito Beach are up-scale beachfront suburbs of Tijuana. As luxury living areas, they were once favored by mid and upper management levels of the drug industry. Once the Mexican Army set up a roadblock on the main artery out of the city, the commute became a drag for the drug lords. They moved elsewhere. Many now reside in the eastern part of Tijuana where visitors from the U.S. rarely go.
Several weeks ago, the Mexican Army and Federal drug agents raided a very large “quinceanero”, (a coming-out party for 15 year old Mexican girls) in Eastern Tijuana. Their catch of some 22 cartel members included a top lieutenant of the area’s major cartel. He was responsible for controlling the local police and beach community where he once lived. He’s been permanently relieved of his duties.
Then too, the mayor of Rosarito, Hugo Torres, is the owner of the Rosarito Beach Hotel, the city’s premier tourist destination. The hotel has suffered as much or more than the city’s overall economy with the collapse of its vibrant tourist industry. No one has a better incentive to rid the area of drug traffickers than Torres. He was quoted in the L.A. Times as saying, “If I owned a hot dog stand, I’d probably move. But I can’t move my hotel, so I have to change the town.”
Yes, Mexico has a problem that is far from solved. It is a major highway for drug movement from throughout Central and South America to the world’s largest, most profitable market for street drugs: the U.S. Municipal police forces struggle against great odds to control the traffic. The low pay scale of rank and file policemen makes them highly susceptible to drug money bribes. Then too, they are badly under-armed to fight the cartels who have become well-armed, sophisticated fighting machines thanks to the steady flow of attack rifles from the unchecked U.S. gun market. They have plenty of US dollar profits to pay for them. It is impossible for city police to obtain similar equipment in Mexico since the Mexican Army fiercely controls such weapons. It has not been that long since Mexico experienced civil war and the Army and Federal Government fear the spread of weaponry beyond their control.
One enterprising former police chief of Rosarito Beach became so frustrated with the situation, that he raised a secret fund from the community. He sent two of his best men to a gun show in Arizona where they easily found a willing agent to buy semi-automatic rifles for them. They then disassembled them to smuggle them across the border to Rosarito, where for the first time, the police were almost as well armed as the cartels. It was easy. Just as easy as the drug cartels arm themselves.
There are areas of Northern Mexico you don’t want to visit…such as Juarez, Nogales and Monterey. These gritty industrial/agricultural areas are now owned by drug cartels. Once drug money controls a city, the cartel members consider it open season for a variety of moneymaking crimes other than drug trafficking. Wealthy members of the community must flee their homes or expose their families to kidnapping and murder. Recent news reports, though, credit the Mexican Army with cleansing the city of Juarez.
Tijuana is still a dangerous city—in the Eastern suburbs. Here, and throughout Mexico, cartels are fighting among themselves as well as against Federal and local authorities. But even East Tijuana’s “war zone” has little affect on the border crossing area, and the border city’s oceanfront suburbs are reasonably safe again.
How do you keep yourself and your family safe in Baja California and Mexico? The same way you do in New York, Chicago or Cleveland. Use common sense. If you want to look for trouble, you can probably find it. But avoid the back streets and trashy bars and dives. Stay to the populated, well-lighted areas of the cities. Don’t travel after dark on backcountry roads. Make sure you have Mexican car insurance in case the police stop you. Keep your passport well protected. (They are as attractive an item for theft here as they are anywhere in the world.)
Is drug trafficking or other criminal activity non-existent in Ensenada, Rosarito Beach and the better parts of Tijuana? Of course not. Will there be more violence in Tijuana and Rosarito? Probably.
Stay out of East Tijuana and Northeast Mexico, but you can count on reasonable safety along the spectacularly beautiful Pacific Coast corridor from the border to Ensenada and on down the Baja peninsula. Thanks to the sluggish U.S. economy as well as all the bad publicity, this summer is a perfect time to enjoy Mexico at bargain prices and with reasonable safety.
We certainly are.
By Glenn Michel
