Current position of the Civic Front for the Defense of the Casino de la Selva in the Costco-Cuernavaca Affair

Our position is that, in general terms, a cultural and natural heritage site of Cuernavaca has been erased from the city’s territory, affecting in various aspects the fundamental human rights:

 

• the “third generation” right to a healthy environment and to cultural identity
• the right of contemporary citizens to enjoy a good life standard (Cuernavaca doen’t have the minimum recommended green areas for its population, nor is there a minimum of recreation and cultural areas).

There has also been a violation of many municipal and federal laws:

• The law for the protection of Historic, Artistic and Archaeological Monuments (we believe all three aspects were touched, since the Casino represented a historical building for its connection with all the major artistic and political events of the 20 th Century, it was no doubt an artistic monument with its mural paintings, sculpture gardens and characteristic buildings, and there were important archaeological remains underground)
• The intellectual property rights of the artists were damaged by the destruction of their work, but also by the fact that they weren’t allowed to have any intervention whatsoever in the restoration process. (Let it be noted here that the mural paintings were never sold to the former owner, and therefore the authors never lost their material property).
• Various Laws for the protection of urban environment, specially those regulating trees preservations
• The ecological impact regulations
• The municipal traffic impact regulations
• The municipal development regulations (which were amended by the present government so as to create ambiguity in the use of ground) Etc…

Cotsco’s presence in the area will further impact small trade, since the local market is located less than ½ mile distance from the facility, and a great number of the small retail shops of the city are concentrated in the close vicinity as well.

The creation of a Museum containing the remaining debris of the murals and a valuable collection of contemporary paintings was only a maneuver to avoid opposition from the cultural authorities and to “clean” Costco’s image before the concerned population.

We have recently won our first legal battle, which is nevertheless a crucial one: A tribunal determined that the ecological impact study which was approved by the local E.I. Commission was unacceptable, and presented at least 17 major violations to the regulations governing this sort of studies. From here, we could star winning other legal suits, such as the one about the torn-down trees.

There is another weak thread in the government’s procedure to auction the land where the Casino stood: it has been proven that there were two different files concerning the buildings standing on the land: one of them contained a comprehensive list of all the buildings, mural paintings, sculptures, and other artistic valuables, and mentioned the presence of a large park and possible presence of a pre-Columbian site, while the other one reported just a “bare land with a few ruined buildings on it, of no value at all”. This could be another major vein to be exploited by our lawyers (who are actually on stand by due to a critical lack of funds).

We have filed a dozen legal suits against the Corporation and against local governmental officials. Some of them claim for a monetary indemnification, some for the resignation and eventual incarceration of the implicated officials and the persons responsible for ordering the destruction of the murals.

In conclusion:

If we had something to claim from Costco in an eventual face-to-face negotiation, we would ask them to move out of town, to restore the area as a cultural center with a park, and to create a fund for cultural activities and for the preservation of cultural and natural heritage in the State of Morelos.