Wednesday Jul 22, 2020

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

San Juan The

50¢

DAILY

Star

American Fashion Nominates Designer of the Year P23

Most of $400 Million for Education Blocked Sorry, Governor.

House Rejects Vázquez Appointee for SIP Panel P5

Woman Suspected of Having COVID-19 Dies After Giving Birth

US Education Dept. Seems to Have No Trust in Local Gov’t Management of Funds CARES Act Money Needed for Atypical Back-to-School

P3

NOTICIAS EN ESPAÑOL P 20

P4

2

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

Queremos ayudarte en la compra de tu nuevo hogar

EN COOP LAS PIEDRAS te lo podemos financiar... ¡Estamos aquí pa ti!

*Pregunta como puedes obtener hasta un 100% de financiamiento.

• RURAL • REHABILITACIÓN • TERRENO • COMERCIAL • CONVENCIONAL • VETERANO • CONSTRUCCIÓN COOP LP NMLS #787612

787.733.2821 EXT: 1918, 1223, 1224, 1231, 1251

CAGUAS • LAS PIEDRAS • SAN LORENZO • HUMACAO • TRUIMPH PLAZA • YABUCOA • HATO REY • CAROLINA Ciertas resticciones aplican. El financiamiento será basado en el tipo de producto hipotecario que aplique en la solicitud Los depósitos y acciones están asegurados por la cantidad de $250.000 por COSSEC. En caso de insolvencia, por estar asegurados con COSSEC estamos excluidos de todo seguro federal.

www.cooplaspiedras.com

4

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

The San Juan Daily Star

US Education Dept. restricts PR’s access to $400 million from CARES Act

By PEDRO CORREA HENRY Twitter: @PCorreaHenry Special to The Star

A

s back-to-school season is about to begin and concerns are being raised as to how it will turn out in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, the United States Department of Education is withholding from the Puerto Rico Department of Education (PRDE) some $400 million in education funds provided by the Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security (CARES) Act. The federal agency cited concerns over how the territory has handled grants in the past and ordered the island government to hire a trustee to manage the money.

According to an article from Education Week, in mid-June, Assistant Secretary for Elementary and Secondary Education Frank Brogan told Gov. Wanda Vázquez Garced and PRDE Secretary Eligio Hernández Pérez via letter that, out of the $400 million from the CARES Act, the department will only release $7.3 million to the island for a 60-day budget period after the official grant award and once the local government hires a third-party agent to handle the funds.

Meanwhile, the rest of the grant money will remain out of the PRDE’s control during that time.

“The [U.S.] department cannot ignore the longstanding challenges that have been associated with Puerto Rico and the PRDE’s fiscal management of federal funds and the impact this has on effective Federal education program implementation,” Brogan said in the June 16 letter to the governor and education secretary.

The challenges that Brogan said he could not ignore were that Puerto Rico had 307,282 students enrolled in its public school system, which makes the island one of the 10 U.S. districts with the largest student enrollment, according to the National Center for Education Statistics. However, the 2017 hurricanes, this past winter’s earthquakes and the current COVID-19 pandemic are now causing long-term problems for both students and teachers on the island.

“Just last year, the U.S. Department of Education’s inspector general found a lack of oversight over disaster aid provided by the federal government to Puerto Rico following Hurricanes Irma and Maria in 2017,” said the

Secretary of Education Eligio Hernández Education Week article. “And the island’s former Secretary of Education Julia Keleher was arrested last year on charges of steering contracts to friends during her tenure; she was arrested a second time earlier this year, again for crimes allegedly committed during her time in office.”

Meanwhile, Education Week said that, according to Brogan’s letter, the entirety of the Puerto Rico government’s CARES Act funds to assist both K-12 and higher education institutions, which totals $47.8 million, will also be put under the control of a trustee. The article also stated that Brogan was told by island government officials that the funds are meant to be used for K-12 education; meanwhile, Puerto Rico will have to document how it plans to use the CARES relief and prepare cost estimates during the two-month period.

Top US House lawmakers criticize decision to withhold Puerto Rico’s CARES K-12 relief U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Education and Labor Chairman Robert C. “Bobby” Scott (D-Va.), along with Rep. Raúl Grijalva (D-Ariz.), who handles Puerto Rico’s oversight, wrote a letter to U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos criticizing the delayed distribution of emergency grant aid to the island as it has only received

1.5 percent of the emergency funds.

“Puerto Rico has experienced program implementation challenges in the past. In 1998, Puerto Rico’s Single Audit Act audit had more than 140 findings,” the congressmen said in their letter. “However, Puerto Rico has consistently worked to address those issues and its most recent audit only contained 24 findings, most of which did not relate to elementary and secondary education. Despite these improvements, the Department has erected bureaucratic hurdles for the release of this emergency grant aid.”

In the letter, the representatives suggested that the entity use different oversight requirements so the funds would be released to the island more promptly. Meanwhile, they also recognized that, back in 2017, as hurricanes Irma and Maria caused $100 billion in damages and destroyed core parts of the island’s education infrastructure, the PRDE appropriated $589 million from the Immediate Aid to Restart School Operations program and provided internal controls and monitoring plans that were successfully implemented and approved by the federal department.

“While ensuring recipients have sufficient internal controls to prevent waste, fraud, and abuse is paramount to the successful implementation of any program, delayed funding distribution has undermined the core purpose of this program,” their letter said. “To address these competing ends the Department should work collaboratively with all recipients to ensure rapid disbursement.”

Scott and Grijalva said in the letter that based on the timeline worked out by the federal department and the island government, Puerto Rico won’t have full access to its CARES education aid until Aug. 15, shortly after the island’s academic year starts for public schools. Meanwhile, the lawmakers requested that the U.S. Department of Education release all documents that detailed the requirements the PRDE must comply with in order to receive the complete CARES relief funds.

The Star requested, through different means, comments from Hernández Pérez, the PRDE secretary, regarding the restrictions imposed on the CARES relief aid and how the department’s back-to-school plan is coming along. The agency’s press secretary replied that the plan was in its final phase, but department officials were too busy Tuesday to accommodate the Star’s requests.

Woman gave all her info for PUA check. Gov’t employee who had her case now can’t be found

By JOHN McPHAUL jpmcphaul@gmail.com

A

woman complained earlier this week after not receiving the payment from the Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (PUA), which she said she requested almost a month ago, that the employee who handled her case at Pedro Rosselló Convention Center in San Juan has disappeared.

According to the complainant, Noemí Díaz, on June 24 she arrived at the Convention Center and claimed the PUA benefit through a technician whom she identified as “Ángel.” The victim said she provided Ángel with all her personal data, including her bank account.

However, after waiting for almost a month and not having received her check and/or deposit, the complainant tried to speak with the technician and allegedly was

informed that the PUA office has not known his whereabouts for some time.

The incident was investigated by the police assigned to the Santurce barracks, who took Díaz’s complaint Monday at the Santurce Precinct 266 Barracks.

Meanwhile, police officers assigned to the Barrio Obrero station in San Juan arrested an individual Monday at the Banco Popular branch on Avenida Borinquén after he tried to cash a PUA check using false identification.

According to preliminary information, the man came with a PUA check and presented a false driver’s license while trying to cash it at the aforementioned banking institution.

Subsequently, the individual was arrested on the premises of the bank branch and was issued a summons for a later date to face the relevant charges.

His case passed to the Bank Robbery Division staff to continue the investigation.

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

5

House declines to confirm alternate member of SIP panel appointed by governor

By THE STAR STAFF

T

he Puerto Rico House of Representatives declined to confirm Carlos M. Rodríguez Muñiz on Tuesday as an alternate member of the Special Independent Prosecutor Panel (PFEI by its Spanish initials), according to information appearing in the House’s Twitter page.

The attorney had been appointed by Gov. Wanda Vázquez Garced to the PFEI before the start of the special session on Tuesday, a day after the panel had voted to investigate her regarding irregularities in the delivery of supplies to earthquake victims in January.

Rodríguez Muñiz served as a judge in the Court of Appeals from 2000 to 2009. He was a Superior Court judge from 1995 to 2000, a district judge from 1988 to 1995 and a municipal judge from 1983 to 1988. In addition, he served as an administrative judge in the Regulations and Permits Administration from 1982 to 1983.

He is presently working in private practice. The rejected nominee has a bachelor of arts degree with a concentration in psychology from the University of Puerto Rico, Río Piedras campus and a law degree from Interamerican University of Puerto Rico Law School.

Vázquez’s opponent in the Aug. 9 primary election for

the gubernatorial candidacy of the New Progressive Party (NPP), Pedro Pierluisi, said in social media that the appointment made by the governor was very inappropriate at a time when the PFEI has assigned special independent prosecutors to investigate her.

After initially not providing sufficient details, the PFEI issued a statement elaborating on the reasons it was investigating the governor in relation to irregularities in the supply of goods to victims of the January earthquake.

The PFEI said that on Jan. 16, 2020, the first analysis of the case was done by Corallys Veguilla Torres, of the Family Department’s Legal Division. Veguilla Torres recommended a summary suspension for irregularities when considering violations of law and regulations.

On Jan. 22, Ernie Cabán, a Legal Division attorney, concluded there were irregularities and deviations from Family Department procedures. On Feb. 24, Ismael Ortiz Roldán conducted a third review using photographs, videos, emails, Facebook posts and photocopies of text messages. He said there were violations of the Ethics Code and the Code of Federal Regulations that governs food distribution under The Emergency Food Assistance Program.

On July 6, then-Justice Secretary Dennise Longo Quinones, a former federal prosecutor, endorsed the content of

evidence collected, and forwarded it to the PFEI with the department’s recommendation.

All investigations concurred with the existence of evidence that could confirm violations of law and regulation, the recommendation said. The information and proof in all those instances were backed by interviews and documents.

In addition, the Justice Department investigation said officials retaliated against former Family Secretary Glorimar Andüjar, after she fired a subordinate for acts contrary to the law and refused to reinstate the subordinate amid pressure from La Fortaleza. Andujar fired Administration of Family Socioeconomic Development head Surima Quiñones for allowing certain politicians, including NPP Sen. Evelyn Vázquez Nieves, to participate in the disbursement of supplies for earthquake victims in what was not supposed to be a political activity.

On Monday, the PFEI issued its resolution concurring with the Justice Department recommendation.

“With the existence of the SIP panel, the test passes through a much more rigorous, objective, impartial and influence-free [process] to assess the test referred, and determine if, finally, complaints are to be filed by a Special Prosecutor before the Superior Court,” according to a statement from the PFEI.

House speaker rejects PDP impeachment petition against Vázquez

By THE STAR STAFF

S

peaker of the Puerto Rico House of Representatives Carlos “Johnny” Méndez Núñez on Tuesday rejected a request by House Minority Leader Rafael “Tatito” Hernández Montañez regarding his petition to impeach Gov. Wanda Vázquez Garced.

In a letter, the lower chamber leader said “we cannot forget that, in representative democracy, elected officials serve the [interests] of the sovereign: the people.”

“The people are very soon to express themselves at the polls in procedures that are also dictated by our Constitution,” Méndez Núñez said. “This [public] servant will never shy away from his legislative responsibilities, but he will never allow himself to believe that he is above the unappealable verdict of the ballot box.”

The House speaker responded to a letter sent in the morning

by Hernández Montañez in which he requested that a “process of residence” be initiated against the governor due to the assignment on Monday of two special independent prosecutors by the Office of the Special Independent Prosecutor Panel. The minority leader’s request was made under the protection of Section 21 of Article III of the Puerto Rico Constitution.

Former San Juan District senator and at-large Senate candidate under the minority Popular Democratic Party, Ramón Luis Nieves, meanwhile, also called on the legislative leaders Tuesday to begin impeachment proceedings against Vázquez after the special independent prosecutor panel office agreed to investigate her.

Nieves accused the governor of attempting to obstruct justice after she appointed a new member to the Office of the Special Independent Prosecutor on Tuesday morning.

“The appointment of a new member to the Office of the Special Independent Prosecutor, the same body that has launched a criminal investigation against her, is an affront to that body’s independence, and another manifestation of obstruction of justice,” Nieves said in a statement.

He said the governor has shown total contempt for the institutions that oversee corruption, emulating former President Richard Nixon, who resigned from office in the 1970s because of the Watergate scandal.

“She did nothing as Secretary of Justice to go after corruption in her own New Progressive Party government,” Nieves said.

“She used her powers for the political persecution of adversaries, as was the case with the mayor of Patillas, Norberto Soto. She [as governor] fired Justice Secretary Dennise Longo [Quiñones], when she knew they were going to refer her to the SIP [special independent prosecutor panel].”

Nieves called on Méndez Núñez and Senate President Thomas Rivera Schatz to “assume their constitutional responsibility, right now, no matter if we are days away from the primaries.”

“The governor is clearly obstructing justice,” he said. “Legislative bodies are obligated to begin the impeachment of a governor who has shown complete disregard for law enforcement.”

The panel also will investigate other government officials including New Progressive Party Sen. Evelyn Vázquez Nieves and La Fortaleza Chief of Staff Antonio Luis Pabón.

La Fortaleza said the governor had already expressed herself on the issue earlier this month during a press conference in which she said she would welcome an investigation and called the allegations “vengeful” and “rigged.”

The former Justice secretary, Longo Quiñones, had issued a statement in early July saying the governor and others were the targets of an investigation that the department had launched earlier this year involving the alleged mismanagement of supplies slated for Puerto Rico residents affected by a series of strong earthquakes.

Longo Quiñones was fired the same day she referred the cases to the special independent prosecutor panel. It was later revealed that an official from the Justice Department was about to drop off files related to the cases slated for investigation at the panel office but abruptly left after receiving a call from someone at the Justice Department.

Wandymar Burgos, the Justice secretary appointed after Longo was fired, later said she was the one who demanded the cases be returned because she had just found out about them and needed to research them. Government officials then demanded that she resign, which she did.

House speaker Carlos Johnny Méndez

6

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

Governor asks Congress for additional food program funds

By JOHN McPHAUL jpmcphaul@gmail.com

G

ov. Wanda Vázquez Garced sent a letter to congressional leadership this week requesting swift action to provide an additional $1.2 billion in emergency federal funding for Puerto Rico’s Nutritional Assistance Program (PAN by its Spanish acronym).

The allocation of funds would enable the government to meet the increased demand for nutritional assistance during the current crisis brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic.

In the letter, the governor also expressed her support for the Equitable Nutrition Assistance for the Territories Act of 2020 (H.R. 6846; S. 677) and the Closing the Gap Act of 2020 (S. 3719), legislation that would address Puerto Rico’s nutrition disparities by transitioning the island, and other territories, into the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP).

As Puerto Rico continues to recover from the 2017 hurricanes Irma and Maria, the seismic events that continue to impact the southern region of the

island, and the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, the island population has experienced an increase in food insecurity. The governor cautioned that if congressional action is not taken by July 31, the government would be forced to reduce and/or eliminate PAN benefits for some 187,040 U.S. citizens living on the island, she said in a press release.

Historically, residents of Puerto Rico do not ordinarily receive the same nutrition benefits as those residing in the states because of the island’s unequal territorial status. PAN assists more than 759,000 low-income families that are caught up in the island’s high poverty rates. Additionally, it is worth noting that over two-fifths of all residents of Puerto Rico (43 percent) and over half of children on the island (57 percent) lived in poverty in 2018, the governor pointed out.

“Puerto Rico is on the cusp of a nutritional assistance cliff with thousands of beneficiaries currently participating in PAN at risk of becoming food insecure,” Vázquez said. “The island and our people have suffered greatly in the past three years, and we continue to battle

COVID-19. With this in mind, our priority will be that the people of Puerto Rico receive the necessary resources to cover their basic needs. I am urging Congress to take action and ensure that our most vulnerable population can have access to the same nutrition assistance benefits as other residents on the U.S. mainland.”

“This additional $1.2 billion in PAN emergency funding will aid thousands

of beneficiaries on the island that are currently recovering from the economic distress that COVID-19 continues to cause,” said Puerto Rico Federal Affairs Administration Executive Director Jennifer M. Storipan. “As we continue to battle this pandemic, we will work with Congress to provide much-needed relief to low-income families and vulnerable individuals who live on the island.”

NPP candidate for San Juan mayor criticizes ‘sale’ of public building

By JOHN McPHAUL jpmcphaul@gmail.com

T

he president of the New Progressive Party in San Juan, Miguel Romero, described the simulated “sale” -- without an auction and for the nominal price of one dollar -- of a building in Puerta de Tierra called “The Temple of the Teacher” as a case of irresponsibility and an attack against public funds at a time when the Municipality of San Juan is in a serious financial situation.

Romero said that on Monday, Mayor Carmen Yulín Cruz Soto filed the Ordinance Bill No. 5, Series 2020-2021, whereby the Municipality of San Juan simulates “selling” for one dollar and without holding a public auction, “The Temple of the Teacher” building. The municipal property is currently under a lease agreement begun in 2015, for a period of 30 years, also for one dollar and without auction, with the Puerto Rican Academy of Jurisprudence and Legislation, which would now be the “alleged buyer,” after also benefiting from a million-dollar investment with public funds in the remodeling of the building.

The facility was transferred from the central government to the Municipality of San Juan in 2012. The transfer was made so that the municipality could

use it to provide “services of a social nature for the general well being,” according to the measure that authorized the transfer.

Romero, who is a candidate for mayor of San Juan, questioned the transaction that the current mayor intends, because the facility was restored through an allocation of public funds amounting to $1 million in 2016, through Joint Resolution 60-2016.

“Practically giving away municipal public facilities, without an auction process, and in which a significant amount of public funds has been invested, is an irresponsible act of major proportions when the

finances of the Capital City are almost bankrupt,” said Romero, who is also a senator representing San Juan. “The Municipality of San Juan is in debt, has millions in judicial claims, debts with service providers, and debts with its employees. What sense does it make to be giving away properties of great value, without even holding a public auction to obtain for the people of San Juan the best economic benefit that the market can give? The Municipality urgently needs money to pay its still owed employee wages and obligations. Every dollar counts and we cannot understand how it is possible to give away properties that can mean income for the Municipality and thus be able to solve the pressing problems of the citizens of San Juan.”

“The Capital City requires that its municipal government maintain its assets for the benefit of all sanjuaneros,” he added. “Giving away high-value municipal public facilities -- by simulating a false sale -- in which significant amounts of public money have been invested, should not be an option in times when the municipal government fails to pay pensions to the central government, it owes money to its employees, needs more resources for the maintenance and up-keep of parks, streets and sidewalks, in short, times when every penny counts and costs every sanjuanero. This is something that we repudiate and that must be stopped and investigated.”

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

7

New York subway, facing a $16 billion deficit, plans for deep cuts

By CHRISTINA GOLDBAUM

F

acing one of the biggest financial crises in the history of the subway, New York’s public transportation agency is preparing drastic measures to restore its finances that are likely to affect riders for years to come.

The measures the agency is drafting include reducing service, slashing the transit workforce, scrapping planned infrastructure improvements, raising tolls beyond scheduled increases and adding to its already record-high debt, according to officials at the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, which runs the city’s subway, buses and two commuter rails.

With forecasts showing a budget shortfall of $16.2 billion through 2024, transit leaders now say that at least some of these cuts are unavoidable as the system copes with the devastating impact of the coronavirus pandemic. The agency’s two year budget for 2020-21 totaled $34.5 billion.

“There have been financial crises before, but never one where the deficits were measured in billions on top of billions on top of billions of dollars,” Patrick J. Foye, the MTA chairman, said in an interview. “That’s why these unpalatable, unacceptable alternatives have to be considered.”

He added: “We are going to have to make hard choices no matter what happens here.”

Across the country, transit systems have been hit particularly hard by the pandemic: Lockdowns led to an over 90% drop in ridership while the cost of running service for essential workers increased because of stringent disinfection protocols.

In New York, transit officials said that they would resort to severe cuts only if they have no other options.

They stressed that additional emergency federal assistance would help stave off some of these reductions — part of a broader political strategy to pressure Washington to provide help as part of the $3 trillion relief package being debated in Congress this week.

Officials say it is not yet clear how the authority will fare this time. In March, the agency received $3.8 billion — nearly its full initial request — in the first federal emergency aid package.

But even with more federal aid, cost-saving efforts and cuts that have already been made, the authority still faces a multibillion-dollar budget hole.

The agency’s increasingly acute financial emergency marks a sharp reversal of the system’s recent strides toward reliability after years of disinvestment plunged the subway into a state of emergency in 2017.

Now the likelihood that the system will be cut back risks undermining New York City’s chance of an economic recovery at a time when its unemployment rate has climbed to over 20%.

“The MTA is both a source of the region’s economy and a reflection of the region’s economy,” said Mitchell Moss, a professor of urban policy and planning at New York University.

“This is the most severe crisis the MTA has ever faced because the state is facing a crisis, the city is facing a crisis.”

The grim financial forecast, which transit officials are expected to present to the authority’s board Wednesday, paints

Transit leaders say they will try to avoid major service cuts but acknowledge that riders may face a diminished system. a bleaker picture for public transit than in past crises.

After the great recession in 2008, the MTA eliminated two subway lines and dozens of bus routes to close a major budget gap. And with the city on the brink of bankruptcy in the 1970s, the subway became a global symbol of urban decay with rampant crime, graffiti-covered trains and constant mechanical breakdowns.

When the pandemic enveloped New York and the city shut down, nearly all of the system’s operating revenue — which comes from fares and tolls, taxes and subsidies — vanished.

Even as New York has started to slowly reopen, daily subway ridership has plateaued at around 20% of its usual 5.5 million passengers in recent weeks.

This year, the agency projects that it will face $5.1 billion in lost fare and toll revenues and $2.1 billion in losses from dedicated taxes and subsidies. In 2021, it estimates those losses at $3.9 billion from fares and tolls and $1.9 billion for subsidies.

To fill the immediate operating budget shortfall, transit officials are lobbying for another $3.9 billion to be included in the next coronavirus relief package. That additional funding would cover the MTA’s operating deficit through the end of the year.

“Without federal funding, the MTA can’t possibly get out of this by being lean without reducing service in a way that would be devastating for riders,” said Rachael Fauss, a senior research analyst at Reinvent Albany, a watchdog group.

But even if the public transit system does receive additional federal assistance this year, the agency will still have to slash spending because of declines in ridership and in dedicated tax revenues, which are expected to drop because of the weakness of the city economy.

The MTA board is expected Wednesday to review initial cost-cutting measures that will provide $1 billion in savings in 2021 by trimming nonessential services, including reducing overtime and eliminating consulting contracts.

To start, transit officials say the authority will probably have to take on more long-term debt and shift funds to cover operating expenses that had been set aside for its $51 billion plan to modernize the antiquated subway system.

The state has already given the MTA permission to divert funds set aside for capital improvements to operating costs over the next two years and to issue bonds so it can borrow up to $10 billion in long-term debt and also borrow up to $3.4 billion as part of a short-term lending program set up by the Federal Reserve.

If the financial situation deteriorates further, transit leaders may have to consider furloughs or layoffs.

In a modest silver lining for riders, the precipitous decline in ridership means that fare hikes that have not already been scheduled in the next two years are unlikely since they would not produce significant new revenue.

8

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

The San Juan Daily Star

Minneapolis Police experience surge of departures in aftermath of George Floyd protests

By JOHN ELIGON

N

early two months after four of its officers were charged with killing George Floyd, the Minneapolis Police Department is reeling, with police officers leaving the job in large numbers, crime surging and politicians planning a top-to-bottom overhaul of the force.

Veteran officers say that morale within the department is lower than they have ever experienced. Some officers are scaling back their policing efforts, concerned that any contentious interactions on the street could land them in trouble. And many others are calling it quits altogether.

“It’s almost like a nuclear bomb hit the city, and the people who didn’t perish are standing around,” Officer Rich Walker Sr., a 16-year Minneapolis police veteran and union official, said of the mood within the department. “I’m still surprised that we’ve got cops showing up to work, to be honest.”

Many American police departments have faced challenges in retention and recruitment in recent years amid growing criticism of police abuses. But the woes in Minneapolis and elsewhere have only grown since May, when Floyd was killed after the police detained him.

Nearly 200 officers have applied to leave the Minneapolis Police Department because of what they describe as post-traumatic stress, said Ronald F. Meuser Jr., a lawyer representing the officers.

The prospect that a department of about 850 could lose about 20% of its force in the coming months has prompted major concern.

Already, about 65 officers have left the department this year, surpassing the typical attrition rate of 45 a year, Chief Medaria Ar-

radondo told the City Council during a meeting last week. Dozens of other officers have taken temporary leave since Floyd’s death, complicating the staffing picture.

Cmdr. Scott Gerlicher, head of the Special Operations and Intelligence Division, wrote in an email to supervisors this month that, “Due to significant staffing losses of late,” the department was “looking at all options” for responding to calls, including shift, schedule and organizational changes.

The email, a copy of which was obtained by The New York Times, also said the department would not “be going back to business as usual.” The guiding principle going forward, Gerlicher wrote, would be to “do no harm,” and he highlighted potential reforms, including, “Looking for reasonable and safe alternatives to police services in some areas.”

“Front line supervisors play the most critical role in making meaningful changes,” he wrote. “Don’t take this lightly.”

Many activists see an overdue reckoning for an institution that they say has long gotten away with brutalizing people of color with impunity.

“Policing as an institution has largely been untouchable, despite the many, many, many failings that are cultural,” said Jeremiah Ellison, a Minneapolis City Council member who supports defunding the police. “Here we are in a moment where people all over the country are saying, ‘No, no, no, no, no, we are interested in real accountability.’”

Instead of embracing change, Ellison added, the police are saying, “You’re picking on us, you don’t know how hard our job is and we’re going home.”

Several officers in Minneapolis said they felt like they all

“It’s almost like a nuclear bomb hit the city, and the people who didn’t perish are standing around,” Officer Rich Walker Sr., a 16-year Minneapolis police veteran and union official, said of the mood within the department.

were being stereotyped because of Derek Chauvin, the white former officer who knelt on Floyd’s neck for more than eight minutes before Floyd died.

“If anything has the propensity to have a violent interaction, we already know we’re judged before they even hear the facts,” said Walker, whose stop of a motorist 11 years ago led to a lawsuit that the city settled for $235,000 after several responding officers punched and kicked the driver.

To Sasha Cotton, director of the Office of Violence Prevention in Minneapolis, there is a cruel irony to officers saying they feel stereotyped. Her office regularly works with Black men and boys to try to keep them out of violence.

“Our officers are experiencing what so often our young men and boys, who we service through the program, say they feel,” she said. “They feel like they are being judged based on the behavior of some of their peers.”

Minneapolis officers say that much of their frustration is rooted in an uncertainty over what comes next. A majority of City Council members have pledged to defund the Police Department, and they are currently in the process of trying to replace the agency with a new public safety department.

Many officers say they feel like city leaders and some residents have turned their backs on them, making them less inclined to go “above and beyond what they need to do,” said Walker, the union official.

“Cops have not been to the work level of before, but it’s not a slowdown,” he added. “They’re just not being as proactive because they know they’re not supported in case something bad happens.”

Officers said they were also concerned about their job security.

Sgt. Anna Hedberg, a 14-year Minneapolis police veteran and board member of the Minneapolis Police Federation, the union representing officers, said a colleague recently told her he had another job opportunity. He has been on the force for six years, but it takes 10 years to be fully vested in his pension, so he was unsure whether he should leave.

“I told him to leave because he’s not happy,” Hedberg said.

The tensions between the city and its Police Department come as crime is on the rise. There have been 16 homicides since June 1, more than twice as many as during the same period last year. Violent crime is up by 20% compared with the same stretch a year ago. Experts say there are many reasons for the spike, not just police staffing levels.

For one senior officer on leave because of PTSD symptoms, the problems started when he could not sleep after long nights of work during the unrest following Floyd’s death. Eventually he got headaches, he said, and lost his appetite and desire to do anything.

“We were stepchildren. We were abandoned,” said the officer, who asked that his name be withheld because he was not authorized to speak to the media.

He saw a therapist, who told him he should take time off.

He is torn about whether he will return.

“I’m coming back to chaos,” he said. “I’m coming back to no leadership. I’m coming back to an administration that doesn’t care about the officers. I’m coming back to a City Council that doesn’t want us here. I’m coming back to a family, or a community, that doesn’t want me here. Why do I want to come back to that?”

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

9

High voter turnout and record fundraising give Democrats hope for November

By NICK CORASANITI and ISABELLA GRULLÓN PAZ

I

t has been one of the most challenging election years in a century: A deadly pandemic upended normal voting in state-by-state primaries, and a rapid expansion of mail-in ballots struggled to meet demand — problems exacerbated by the decadeslong hollowing out of the Voting Rights Act and new, Republican-backed lawsuits to restrict ballot access.

And yet: Overall turnout among voters casting ballots for Democratic presidential candidates so far this year has already surpassed primary season levels in 2016, as did fundraising between April and June.

Democrats are nearing the record numbers set in 2008 on both counts, even though the marquee 2020 race, for the Democratic presidential nomination, largely ended in March with Joe Biden as the presumptive nominee.

Roughly 34 million Democrats have already cast their ballots in 2020, and major states like New York, New Jersey and Connecticut have yet to report official results, meaning the number will most likely be millions more. By contrast, in 2016, just under 31 million Democrats voted in a more contested presidential primary race; in 2008, more than 37 million voted in the primaries.

The apparent energy in the Democratic base could foreshadow significant turnout in the November general election, even as the coronavirus continues to scramble the political process. The trend is especially notable in some traditionally Republican states like Texas, Georgia and Arizona, as well as Democratic-leaning states that Republicans often contest, like Virginia.

There is ample evidence of enthusiasm among the Republican base, too. Despite President Donald Trump’s lack of a serious challenger within the party, more than 14 million people have voted in Republican primaries, according to data from The Associated Press. That is nearing the 18 million ballots cast in the contested 2012 Republican primary and outpaces turnout in 2004, the last time there was a Republican incumbent. The Trump campaign received 725,000 individual donations online in the second quarter, which campaign officials

boasted was rare in Republican politics.

As for the impetus of the energy coursing through the Democratic electorate, political analysts point to the prospect of getting Trump out of office as the core reason for voter engagement.

“The intensity around ousting Donald Trump, which we saw on full display in 2018, has not waned one bit,” said Amy Walter, the national editor of the nonpartisan Cook Political Report. “That enthusiasm in coming out to vote is saying, ‘I’m letting everyone know that I am showing up now — in a primary that’s over and in a pandemic — to send a signal that I am going to show up in November.’”

For Democrats, 20 states have surpassed 2016 turnout levels, and multiple states that haven’t yet certified results are likely to join them. Nine states have surpassed 2008 levels. On Tuesday, Texas Democrats obliterated the record for turnout in a Democratic statewide runoff election, with an unofficial tally of 955,735. The previous record, set in 2018, was 432,180.

Georgia, one of the few states to mail ballot applications to all its registered voters, saw nearly 1.3 million people vote in its Democratic presidential and Senate primary in June, even though Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont had already dropped out of the race. It was a 68% increase in turnout from 2016, and a 20% increase over 2008.

“One inference you can make is that getting the absentee ballot applications made it easier, and more people decided to vote by mail,” said Trey Hood, the director of the Survey Research Center at the School of Public and International Affairs at the University of Georgia.

Hood said that about half of the primary voters in Georgia this year did not vote in the 2016 primary, and that around 50% of ballots cast this year were absentee. In 2016, just around 2% were absentee ballots.

Numerous studies have found that voting by mail has not traditionally favored one party over the other. But as the president falsely denounces the process as “corrupt,” Democrats around the country are requesting ballots at a far higher rate than Republicans are.

A few states have seen a major drop-off in turnout in 2020. While some of that can be attributed to a less competitive presiden-

Texans showed up to vote in Dallas in the primary runoff elections on July 14. tial primary, states that weren’t adequately prepared for the pandemic were also deeply affected. Illinois, which held its primary on March 17, just as the coronavirus crisis was beginning to take hold in the United States, made few preparations, forcing polling stations around Chicago to shutter at the last minute because of a shortage of poll workers. In previous election years, turnout in the state was around 2 million; this year around 500,000 fewer votes were cast.

The state with the biggest decrease, Ohio, changed its election date multiple times because of the pandemic, the result of a clash between the governor and state Legislature.

Some of the higher turnout in Democratic primaries can also be attributed to the decision by at least six states, including Washington, Minnesota and Colorado, to switch from holding caucuses to more traditional primary elections. Primaries tend to be more accessible for voters who might not have time to caucus for hours in a day.

Democrats up and down the ballot are also setting records with their fundraising.

After months in which the Trump campaign’s fundraising numbers dwarfed those of the Democratic primary candidates, Biden outraised Trump in June by $10 million.

That same dynamic is at play in several Senate races. Amy McGrath, the Democratic nominee in Kentucky running against Sen. Mitch McConnell, the Senate majority lea-

der, has already raised $41 million, $17.4 million of which came in the second quarter of 2020. Jamie Harrison, the Democratic challenger to Sen. Lindsey Graham in South Carolina, raised just under $14 million in the second quarter, while Mark Kelly, who is running against Sen. Martha McSally in Arizona, raised $12.8 million.

This cycle has also experienced an uptick in out-of-state donations fueling competitive Democratic primaries, said Sheila Krumholz, the executive director of the Center for Responsive Politics.

The nationalization of donations, she noted, was amplified by ActBlue, the Democrats’ widely used and readily available fundraising software. When local races turn into national causes, such as ousting a loathed incumbent or backing an insurgent challenger, the ease of donating digitally across state lines has significantly increased cash flow.

“There are new and profound factors or issues that voters are considering in their political engagement, and that includes in their political donations,” Krumholz said.

Walter, of the Cook Political Report, noted that as politics has become increasingly nationalized in the Trump era, it’s often the candidates, rather than geography, driving voter enthusiasm, especially among Democrats. “Who you’re running against is almost as important as where you’re running,” she said.

10

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

Biden to announce $775 billion plan to help working parents and caregivers

By SHANE GOLDMACHER and CLAIRE CAIN MILLER

J

oe Biden will announce a $775 billion investment in caregiving programs Tuesday, with a series of proposals covering care for small children, older adults and family members with disabilities. His campaign hopes the plan will land with particular resonance during a pandemic that has severely affected the caregiving needs of millions of American families.

The speech, near his home in Wilmington, Delaware, will be the third of four economic rollouts that Biden, the former vice president and presumptive Democratic nominee, is doing before the Democratic National Convention next month. He is seeking to blunt one of the few areas of advantage — the economy — that President Donald Trump maintains even as Trump’s overall standing has dipped.

Biden’s plans are intended to appeal to voters who are now more acu-

tely aware of how essential caregivers are, as a health crisis has shuttered schools — a source of child care for many Americans — and limited the options to care for older relatives who are more vulnerable to the coronavirus.

But they are also aimed at the caregivers themselves, promising more jobs and higher pay. His campaign estimated that the new spending would create 3 million new jobs in the next decade, and even more after accounting for people able to enter the work force instead of serving as unpaid, athome caregivers.

In a conference call outlining the plan Monday night, the Biden campaign framed the issues as an economic imperative to keep the country competitive globally, and to enable it to recover from the economic crisis brought on by the pandemic. The United States is the only rich country without paid family leave and has no universal child care; research has shown that labor force participation has stalled because of that.

But advisers to Biden, whose campaign has made empathy a central component of his 2020 candidacy, also repeatedly invoked the former vice president’s own history as a single father. Biden’s first wife and his 1-yearold daughter died in a car accident in 1972, shortly before he was first sworn into the U.S. Senate. His two sons survived the accident.

The Biden campaign is expected to announce proposals to eliminate the waiting list for home and community care under Medicaid, which has roughly 800,000 people on it; provide fresh funding to states and groups that explore alternatives to institutional care; and add 150,000 new community health workers. His campaign said that coronavirus outbreaks in nursing homes had highlighted the necessity of providing care for aging adults at home.

For young children, he is proposing to start with a bailout for child care centers, many of which are at risk of closing amid the pandemic because

Former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. at the Chase Center in Wilmington, Del., last week.

they are financed almost entirely by private payments. Even before lockdowns began, they operated on very small profit margins.

Biden will also propose national pre-K for all children ages 3 and 4, and his campaign pointed to research that has shown that such programs help women work and shrink racial and socioeconomic achievement gaps.

The plan would address the dearth of child care by providing financing for the construction of new child care facilities, including at workplaces and in rural areas.

Biden’s plan also calls for increased pay for child care workers — who are disproportionately women and minorities — along with health benefits, career training and the ability to unionize.

A campaign document about the plan said: “There is no reason an educator teaching toddlers should be making less than a similarly qualified kindergarten educator.” On average, U.S. preschool teachers earn less than $30,000 a year, while kindergarten teachers earn more than $50,000, according to researchers at the University of California, Berkeley.

The plan would provide benefits for people who don’t work to care for family members, an idea that has recently gained support from both parties. The proposal would give unpaid caregivers a $5,000 tax credit as well as Social Security credits.

Biden’s campaign said the programs, some of which would be operated with state and local officials, would be paid for by rolling back some taxes on real estate investors with incomes over $400,000, as well as by increasing tax enforcement on the wealthy.

Biden will speak in New Castle, Delaware, not far from the home where he has mostly stayed put since the coronavirus began sweeping the country in March. His first economic address was focused on reinvigorating manufacturing and strengthening “Buy American” rules; the second was on building the infrastructure of new, greener economy; and the final one will be about advancing “racial equity,” the campaign has said.

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

11

Two women sue Fox News, claiming misconduct by Ed Henry and others

By MICHAEL M. GRYNBAUM

F

ox News fired Ed Henry, one of the network’s most prominent anchors, this month after the network investigated a former employee’s accusation of sexual misconduct against him.

On Monday, the former employee sued Henry and Fox News, describing a history of workplace harassment and a relationship with the anchor that she said included violent sex and rape. The woman, Jennifer Eckhart, a former associate producer at Fox Business, said that Henry had coerced her into a sexual relationship by promising to advance her career.

A co-plaintiff, Cathy Areu, a frequent guest on Fox News programs, alleged in the lawsuit that Henry had harassed her, as well, by sending sexually explicit messages. Areu also described exchanges with other Fox News stars, including anchors Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity and Howard Kurtz, that she called inappropriate and sexually charged.

Fox News, in a statement, said that it had retained an outside law firm to investigate Areu’s claims and determined them to be “false, patently frivolous and utterly devoid of any merit.” Fox News issued the statement on behalf of the network as well as Carlson, Hannity and Kurtz, who were also named as defendants in the suit.

The network did not challenge Eckhart’s allegations against Henry, noting: “Fox News already took swift action as soon as it learned of Ms. Eckhart’s claims on June 25, and Mr. Henry is no longer employed by the network.”

A lawyer for Henry, Catherine Foti, said in a statement that the lawsuit’s allegations against her client were “fictional,” adding: “The evidence in this case will demonstrate that Ms. Eckhart initiated and completely encouraged a consensual relationship. Ed Henry looks forward to presenting actual facts and evidence.”

Fox News has said previously that it suspended Henry as soon as executives learned of Eckhart’s allegations against him; the anchor was fired several days later. His dismissal was an echo of Fox News’ past scandals involving workplace harassment and sexual misconduct, which prompted the exits of its founder, Roger E. Ailes, and host Bill O’Reilly.

The lawsuit, filed Monday in U.S. District Court in Manhattan, depicts an environment where powerful male hosts regularly flirted with junior female personnel and promised career help in exchange for sexual attention.

Eckhart, who joined Fox Business in her early 20s, alleged that Henry, an established star at Fox News, “preyed upon, manipulated and groomed” her.

The former Fox News anchor Ed Henry, left, on an episode of “Fox & Friends” from last year.

The lawsuit, which includes cropped screenshots of sexually explicit text exchanges, describes Eckhart being coerced into a relationship with Henry in which he demanded sadomasochistic sexual favors, culminating in a “violent, painful rape” in a Manhattan hotel room in 2017.

Eckhart said in the lawsuit that she complained to a human resources executive about “a toxic work environment” in February 2020 but that the network did not follow up with her. On June 12, Eckhart was let go. She approached the network June 25 with her claims about Henry, who was fired July 1.

Eckhart and Areu are represented by the law firm of Douglas H. Wigdor, a prominent lawyer in workplace harassment cases who has sued Fox News on several occasions.

A partner at the firm, Michael J. Willemin, said Monday that the law firm retained by Fox News to investigate his clients’ claims “did not even speak with either of our clients,” and he called on Fox News to release a copy of its internal investigation.

Fox News said that its investigators “requested in writing the opportunity to speak directly with each plaintiff with their attorneys present.” The network said that Wigdor’s firm would make the plaintiffs avai-

lable only if the interviews “could not be used in any future litigation or proceeding,” a position that Fox News called legally “unreasonable.”

Areu, who was a frequent guest on Fox News shows but not employed by the network, said in the lawsuit that Hannity, on set in 2018, urged male members of his crew to take her on a date and referred to her as “a beautiful woman.” She said that Carlson, after she appeared on his show in 2018, told Areu that he was staying alone in a Manhattan hotel without his family. She said that Kurtz, in 2019, invited her to meet him in the lobby of his hotel and was miffed when she declined.

In all three instances, according to the lawsuit, Areu said that she suffered career repercussions and was rarely invited back to appear on the hosts’ programs. Areu also said that Gianno Caldwell, a Fox News contributor, inappropriately asked her to lunch in exchange for a meeting with star pundit Ann Coulter.

Eckhart and Areu are seeking damages against Fox News and the defendants for sexual harassment, creating a hostile work environment, retaliation, and in the case of Eckhart and Henry, violations of laws against sex trafficking.

12

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

Stocks

S&P 500 turns positive for 2020, but most stocks are missing the party

T

he benchmark S&P 500 U.S. stock index is now positive for the year, yet most of its components have sat out the rally.

After a steep, months-long climb, the index is up 0.8% on the year and at its highest level since Feb. 21.

Yet for every stock that has advanced on the S&P 500 this year, 1.7 have declined, according to Michael O’Rourke, chief market strategist at JonesTrading in Greenwich, Connecticut.

That is partially because investors have gravitated to a small group of tech-related stocks they believe have the best chance of delivering steady profits in a climate fraught with uncertainty over the coronavirus pandemic and its economic fallout.

The five most valuable S&P 500 companies - Apple Inc, Microsoft Corp, Amazon.com Inc, Alphabet Inc and Facebook Inc - account for some 23% of the index’s market capitalization, the highest level on record, according to Goldman Sachs.

“It’s hard to imagine the index going up if you lose that leadership,” said Robert Phipps, director at Per Stirling in Austin, Texas. “Most of the market is really not participating here.”

Tech-related sectors to which those stocks belong have outperformed other sectors by significant margins this year. The technology index, which includes Apple and Microsoft, has climbed about 18%, while the consumer discretionary index, which includes Amazon, has jumped 15%. The communication services index, which includes Alphabet and Facebook, has risen nearly 6%.

Only one other sector, healthcare, has had year-todate gains.

While U.S. equity valuations stand at their highest level since the dot-com boom, the flight to large-cap, techrelated companies reflects caution rather than euphoria, said Quincy Krosby, chief market strategist at Prudential Financial in Newark, New Jersey.

Moreover, the top five S&P 500 companies today have a greater share of the index’s earnings and trade at a lower multiple than the top five companies in 2000 did, Jonathan Golub, chief U.S. equity strategist at Credit Suisse, wrote in a research note on Tuesday.

Given their relatively strong balance sheets and steadier revenue streams, many investors believe largecap, tech-related companies are better positioned to withstand the economic pressures resulting from the novel coronavirus pandemic.

MOST ASSERTIVE STOCKS

PUERTO RICO STOCKS

COMMODITIES

CURRENCY

LOCAL PERSONAL LOAN RATES Bank

LOCAL MORTGAGE RATES Bank

FHA 30-YR POINTS CONV 30-YR POINTS

BPPR Scotia CooPACA Money House First Mort Oriental

3.00% 0.00 3.50% 0.00 3.50% 2.00 3.75% 2.00 3.50% 0.00 3.50% 0.00

3.50% 000 4.00% 0.00 3.75% 2.00 3.75% 2.00 5.50% 0.00 3.75% 5.50

PERS.

CREDIT CARD

AUTO

BPPR --.-- 17.95 4.95 Scotia 4.99 14.99 4.99 CooPACA

6.95 9.95

2.95

Reliable

--.-- --.--

4.40

First Mort 7.99 --.-- --.-Oriental 4.99 11.95 4.99

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

13

EU adopts groundbreaking stimulus to fight Coronavirus recession

By MATINA STEVIS-GRIDNEF

A

fter nearly five days of intense haggling, European Union leaders early on Tuesday stepped up to confront one of the gravest challenges in the bloc’s history, agreeing to a landmark spending package to rescue their economies from the ravages of the pandemic.

The 750 billion euro ($857 billion) stimulus agreement, spearheaded by Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany and President Emmanuel Macron of France, sent a strong signal of solidarity even as it exposed deep new fault lines in a bloc reshaped by Britain’s exit.

The deal was notable for its firsts: European countries will raise large sums by selling bonds collectively, rather than individually; and much of that money will be handed out to member nations hit hardest by the pandemic as grants that do not have to be repaid, and not as loans that would swell their national debts.

Those extraordinary steps reflected a difficult consensus among members: that the scale of the crisis facing them required groundbreaking measures to ensure the bloc’s legitimacy, stability and prosperity.

“Europe has shown it is able to break new ground in a special situation. Exceptional situations require exceptional measures,” Merkel said in a news conference at dawn. ”A very special construct of 27 countries of different backgrounds is actually able to act together, and it has proven it.”

But the lengthy negotiations in Brussels were notable, too, for their exceptional rancor — and it was clear that the pooling of resources and sovereignty had come at a cost.

A strange kind of political theater, never visited upon EU summits before, marked the meeting — with leaders donning masks and bumping elbows to greet. They were safely spaced in a vast hall, their entourages trimmed to only the most essential members.

When they convened on Friday, it was their first in-person summit in the five months since the coronavirus took hold in Europe. The meeting was officially scheduled to last until Saturday. By Monday morning, exhausted and angry after bargaining all night, they were still tussling over the details. The start of Monday’s session was twice delayed, and then it spilled into Tuesday morning.

As negotiations broke down over the weekend, so did many precautions the leaders and their teams had taken to protect themselves from the virus, which in most of Europe has been brought down to manageable levels, in any case. As the hours wore on and the talks grew heated, the diplomatic gloves came off, and so did the masks. Breakout groups met in rooms far smaller and less ventilated than the 300-seat auditorium where the general meeting was convened.

While there is no underestimating the importance of the agreement — the generosity of its size and the novelty of its mechanisms — the acrimony and dramatics of the four-day meeting betrayed the new divisions within the bloc. They also signaled where the fractures may lie in future crises.

The talks were defined by shifting roles among members now jostling to make their voices heard and for leadership in the

European leaders were tasked with negotiating a proposed 750 billion euro ($860 billion) rescue package to support member countries dealing with the economic collapse caused by the pandemic. absence of Britain, which had often played the part of the thrifty contrarian, fastidious about rules, in past summits.

This time, Merkel, unusually for a German leader, and holding the EU’s rotating presidency, put her finger on the scale on behalf of hard-hit southern countries and did battle with the nations she once championed, the northern members that have been less affected by the virus and are wary of the vast sums being thrown around.

Where Friday’s meeting was marked by joyful greetings and even celebrations of the birthdays of two leaders — Merkel, now 66, and Prime Minister Antonio Costa of Portugal, who turned 59 — Sunday night’s dinner (a “cold dish” after several sumptuous meals, socially spaced but unmasked) was marked by shouting matches and a nasty atmosphere.

Macron, for example, yelled at Chancellor Sebastian Kurz of Austria for not only being a tightfisted impediment to the rescue deal but also for leaving the room to take a call. To some leaders’ shock, the French president slapped the table. Kurz tried to keep his cool, and in a zinger put Macron’s temper tantrum down to sleep deprivation, diplomats said.

As talks broke up without a deal around 6 a.m. Monday, Mark Rutte, the Dutch prime minister, told his country’s media that he didn’t care if other leaders mockingly called him “Mr. No” for blocking the agreement. (They did.)

It was Rutte who stepped into the vacuum left by Germany’s shift and Britain’s departure to lead the so-called Frugal Four, which include his nation as well as Austria, Sweden and Denmark. Occasionally, the “frugals” became five with the support of Finland.

In the end, with a unanimous decision by the 27 nations needed for a plan to go forward, a bitter compromise prevailed.

The ambitious plan pushed by Merkel and Macron was watered

down, but remained significant. The overall figure of 750 billion euros remained, but an original proposal to offer 500 billion euros of that in the form of grants was trimmed back to 390 billion euros, with 360 billion euros earmarked for loans.

In addition to raising cash and extending grants, the package will increase lending and deploy other, more traditional stimulus methods to arrest and reverse the economic free-fall that threatens the stability of the world’s richest bloc of nations.

Economists predict a recession far worse than anything since World War II. France, Italy and Spain, the bloc’s second-, third- and fourth-largest economies, are expected to suffer the most, clocking in contractions of around 10% this year.

Greece and other smaller economies that are still recovering from the last recession will also be badly affected by the downturn. But heavy debt loads in many of these nations make them reluctant to amass yet more debt, and their budgets aren’t sufficient to self-fund their recoveries. That led them to turn to the EU for help.

Together with the vast bond-buying program by the European Central Bank, national stimulus plans worth trillions of euros, and other, smaller EU support schemes for banks, businesses and workers, European leaders hope to reverse the recession in 2021 and spend their way into a rapid and powerful recovery.

They also agreed on Tuesday on the bloc’s regular budget for the next seven years: 1.1 trillion euros to finance the normal EU policies on agriculture, migration and hundreds of other programs.

But the deal came at a heavy price in progressive goals attached to EU values and norms. To bring Hungary and Poland on board, EU leaders decided to water down the caveat making funding conditional on the rule-of-law benchmarks that the two nations’ illiberal governments are violating.

14

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

The San Juan Daily Star

With tourists gone, Bali workers return to farms and fishing

A fish market in Kuta, Bali, Indonesia, on July 6, 2020. Many resort workers have gone home to villages and small towns, taking up traditional ways of earning a living to feed themselves and their families.

By NYIMASLAULA and RICHARD C. PADDOCK

N

i Nyoman Ayu Sutaryani, a mother of three, made a steady living for two decades working as a masseuse and yoga instructor at Bali’s luxury hotels and spas. Now at 37 she finds herself back on the farm of her childhood village here, standing precariously at the top of a tall bamboo ladder, picking cloves.

It is not the life that Ayu had imagined for herself. But on Bali, which depends heavily on tourism, she is one of thousands of workers who have been forced by the coronavirus pandemic to return to their villages and traditional ways of making a living.

“This is my first time being jobless, and sometimes I want to cry,” Ayu said. “Everything is returning to the old time. That’s what we have to do rather than starving.”

Like Ayu, many have returned to their family farms, helping to plant and harvest crops. Others feed their families by digging for clams in shallow Benoa Bay or by casting fishing lines out to sea from one of Bali’s deserted beaches.

In a sign of how far the economy of the Indonesian island has declined, some rural residents have turned to bartering fruit and vegetables so that they can save their limited cash to buy necessities.

Bali, with a population of 4.4 million and eight times the physical size of Singapore, is Indonesia’s tourism engine, boasting spectacular beaches, terraced rice fields,

scenic temples and ideal weather. Largely Hindu in a predominantly Muslim nation, Bali carved out its own identity as a tourist destination decades ago and was once widely viewed from abroad as an independent country. Hoping to capitalize on the Bali name, the central government began a campaign last year to create 10 “new Bali” destinations.

More than half of Bali’s economy depends directly on tourism and a quarter is engaged in tourism-related activities, such as transporting visitors and supplying food to hotels and restaurants. Last year, Bali attracted more than 6 million tourists from abroad and 10 million from Indonesia.

The number of hotels keeps growing; some international chains operate more than two dozen. President Donald Trump has gotten in on the act, partnering with a politically connected billionaire to build a Trump-branded hotel and golf resort.

The economy has suffered through other disasters: the 2002 Bali bombing, the 2003 severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) epidemic and the 2017 eruption of the Mount Agung volcano. But the coronavirus outbreak has been the most devastating.

In March, Indonesia banned foreign visitors from the worst-hit countries and, weeks later, extended the ban to all foreign tourists. In May, the government banned domestic tourists from traveling to Bali, although officials and business travelers with a negative coronavirus test were allowed.

Nevertheless, Indonesia has surpassed China in the number of cases to become the country hit hardest in East Asia, with more than 88,000 cases and 4,200 deaths as of Monday. On Bali, the number of cases has doubled, to 2,781, and deaths have quadrupled, to 44, in a little more than three weeks.

The travel restrictions have slammed Bali’s tourism industry. During the first half of the year, the island received 1.1 million foreign tourists, almost all of them before the pandemic. That was a drop from nearly 2.9 million during the same period last year. Comparative figures for domestic tourists were not available.

Impatient to revive the economy, Bali’s governor, I Wayan Koster, began gradually reopening the island this month, including restaurants and popular beaches. He hopes to bring back domestic tourists to Bali starting next week and attract foreign tourists beginning Sept. 11.

For a generation, young people have been drawn from villages in northern Bali to work in the tourist centers, mainly in southern Bali. Many attend tourism vocational schools before taking jobs in hotels, restaurants and tour agencies.

“Tourism has become the dominant work for most people,” said Ricky Putra, chair of the Bali Hotels Association.

The pandemic has forced hotels and other tourist facilities to lay off some workers and cut the pay and hours of others. Larger hotels have kept skeleton staffs on duty, rotating workers in for a week or two at a time, while allowing them to make a little money and return to their villages.

“Mostly they are going back to their villages,” said Ricky, who is also general manager of the Santrian Resorts and Villas hotel group. “Some of them can use this very challenging time to help their parents and go back to their village farming or fishing.”

Across the island, some communities give food aid to the unemployed, such as rice, instant noodles, cooking oil and sugar. But recipients say it is not enough to live on. Many also have debts, like installment payments for motorbikes, a common mode of transportation on the island.

At Benoa Bay, on the southern end of the island, low tide attracts dozens of people from villages nearby to dig for clams, using rakes made of scrap wood, nails or even their bare hands and feet. On a good day, one can collect more than a pound of clams.

Some also hunt for small crabs using a wooden stick with two iron hooks that are bent like fingers. If their families are lucky enough to have traditional boats, known as a jukung, they go out to sea and catch shrimp.

Kadek Merta, 34, who was digging for clams recently, said he had been a hotel steward but had not worked since March.

“I feel hollow,” he said. “There is no job. I can only survive by depending on the sea.”

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

15

For women in Afghan security forces, a daily battle

By MUJIB MASHAL

M

otivated, educated and fresh from finishing police academy in Turkey, 2nd Lt. Zala Zazai had stellar qualifications for the job she took in eastern Afghanistan in June. It all mattered little once she started.

On social media, she was called a prostitute, and men wrote that her very presence on the force would corrupt Khost province, where she was posted. Her colleagues at police headquarters — where she was the only female officer on a staff of nearly 500 — tried to intimidate her into wearing a conservative head scarf and traditional clothes instead of her uniform, and to hide in back corners of the office away from the public, she said. Shopkeepers arrived at the station’s gates with no other business but to get a look at this novelty.

Zazai, 21, came home from her first day feeling sick and frightened. She felt so unsafe that she asked her mother, Spesalai, who had accompanied her from Kabul, to stay with her at a shelter deep inside police headquarters. At night, the two women locked the door. During the day, Zala Zazai scrambled to expedite the paperwork for a pistol.

“I want to have something to defend myself with,” she said.

Helping Afghan women, who were banished to their homes by the Taliban during their government in the 1990s, became a rallying cry for Western involvement in Afghanistan after the U.S. invasion in 2001.

Two decades later, the rise of a generation of educated, professional Afghan women is an undeniable sign of change.

Now, with the possibility of powersharing talks opening between the Taliban and the Afghan government, many women are worried that the strides they have made are at risk. What adds to their concern is how fragile the gains remain after two decades, where every mundane step is still a daily battle.

Even after more than a billion dollars spent on women’s empowerment projects, the daily reality for women trying to break into public roles — particularly with the government and the security forces — remains bleak. Women are still almost completely absent in high-level meetings where decisions of war, peace and politics are made.

Work for women at routine jobs is a daily barrage of harassment, insult and abuse.

Among the police forces, which have been the focus of diversification efforts for years, women still make up only 2.8% of employees — and that is the highest level in 18 years. Most of those 3,800 women are in hidden roles with little contact with the public, officials acknowledged. Only five of the total of about 200 military and civilian leadership positions at the Interior Ministry are occupied by women.

For much of the past two decades, the task of including women in the police force often fell on former warlords and commanders whose beliefs about women differed only slightly from the Taliban’s, if at all.

President Ashraf Ghani has increased the number of female ambassadors, introduced female deputy governors and ministers, and sent female deputies to the ministries of defense and interior. But Afghan society remains deeply patriarchal, and the few women who have risen to such positions face many difficulties.

The strategy to include more women at less senior positions has been mostly to spend money and meet modest quotas. In the past six years, the Afghan government and its Western allies have spent more than $100 million on building facilities to support Afghan women in the security forces. In Nangarhar province, they spent $6 million on a training facility for female police officers that remains unused three years after completion.

After repeated failures, recruitment efforts essentially boiled down to bribing women to join the force and stay. A woman’s incentives to join the police include eight more benefits than her male counterparts, according to Hosna Jalil, the deputy minister of interior. On several occasions, women of retirement age were allowed to fake their IDs and lower their age to stay on the force, she said.

Still, the goal of a 5% female presence in the police forces has never been met.

“Every province I have gone to, the first thing I say is that you are a force that is only working for men — not for women or children, the two most vulnerable categories who are left behind,” Jalil said.

It is not because qualified, willing women are lacking. It is because to join the police is to endure abuse and degradation.

Over the years, sexual harassment had been rampant in the security forces, with reports that the wives of officers killed in line of duty were harassed when they came

to collect death benefits. The perception that female police officers were frequently harassed meant that women who were victims of domestic violence and other crimes dared not visit police stations.

“If only we had guaranteed a father that the dignity of your daughter is more protected in the ranks of the police because she has authority and professionalism here,” Jalil said. “We haven’t been able to create that mentality.”

Before Jalil began her job as the deputy minister for strategy and policy — hired by Ghani to be fresh eyes in an institution long seen as corrupt and dysfunctional — she had to fight for acceptance.

Generals walked out of meetings when they found out she was in charge. Subordinates often fed her wrong information to undermine her.

“I often have to say I am not the head of the gender department — I am the policy and strategy deputy to the minister of interior.

I work for this large force that is both male and female,” Jalil said. “I may have a female outlook, but any woman who comes should come for their expertise, not for them being a woman.”

These days, despite frequent sexist attacks on social media, Jalil says she has found her footing as part of a leadership team that is working to reform the police.

They spend long hours in a quiet basement office poring over charts of a bloated structure that they are trimming, and have removed unnecessary bureaucratic steps

that created opportunities for corruption.

They are trying to hold the officers to new standards of accountability, and to better care for the families of tens of thousands of police officers killed in decades of war.

Zazai, who serves at the police headquarters in Khost, grew up in Kabul, the capital. Her mother, Speselai Zazai, has been the head of their household for seven years, and although her male relatives were opposed, she, her older sister, and her mother attended after-hours university classes financed with their own day jobs. Another sister is a student of Islamic studies.

She and her older sister are now both police officers. But they were only willing to take the first step when the opportunity to train in Turkey came up because of concerns about harassment and abuse in the local training academies.

For the first two weeks, Zala Zazai would spend her days at work, and in the evening she would retreat to the government guesthouse where her mother kept her company. She hadn’t faced a direct physical threat, she said, but she was aware of the reality, and her lack of a weapon added to her vulnerability.

She was devastated when her mother had to go back to Kabul, but Zala Zazai is trying to make a go of it in Khost.

“May God make it easier,” she said.

“But I have to find the strength — because it can’t go on like this, women should claim their place. I know if I spend a year here, it will make a difference.”

Hosna Jalil, deputy minister of the interior, at a government meeting where only one other woman, Kabul’s deputy governor, was present, in Kabul, Afghanistan, June 20, 2020

16

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 22, 2020 United StateS diStrict coUrt For the diStrict oF PUerto rico

In re: The FInancIal OversIghT and ManageMenT BOard FOr PuerTO rIcO, as representative of The cOMMOnWealTh OF PuerTO rIcO, et al. debtors.1 In re: The FInancIal OversIghT and ManageMenT BOard FOr PuerTO rIcO, as representative of The PuerTO rIcO PuBlIc BuIldIngs auThOrITY, debtor.

PrOMesa Title III case no. 17-BK-3283-lTs (Jointly administered)

PrOMesa Title III case no. 19-BK-5523-lTs (Jointly administered) this Motion relates only to PBa, and shall be filed in case no. 17-BK-3283-LtS and case no. 19-BK-5523-LtS

FinaL reMinder to aLL creditorS oF the PUerto rico PUBLic BUiLdinGS aUthoritY, and to other PartieS in intereSt, PLeaSe taKe notice oF the FoLLoWinG: The Financial Oversight and Management Board for Puerto rico (the “Oversight Board”) has filed a voluntary petition under section 304(a) of the Puerto Rico Oversight, Management, and Economic Stability Act (“PrOMesa”),2 initiating a Title III case under PrOMesa (a “Title III case”) for the Puerto rico Public Buildings authority (“PBa” or the “debtor”) on september 27, 2019. You may be a creditor of PBa, and you may be required to file a proof of claim (“Proof of claim”). if you have already filed a Proof of claim, no further action is required unless directed by court order, notice, or otherwise. oVerVieW – KeY PointS • This document is a legal notice concerning PBa’s Title III case. This document is being sent to all parties that may be owed money by PBa (known as “creditors”).

• the overview on this page describes the key terms of this document. Please read the entire document carefully for further details.

• In a Title III case under PrOMesa, creditors of PBa may be required to file claim forms stating the amount of money owed to them as of the day the Title III case was filed. This document explains how to file claims.

• Many creditors of PBa are not required to file a claim. This notice explains who is required to file a claim and who is not required to file a claim. Please see Section 2 of this notice for a complete list of parties not required to file a claim.

• if you are not required to file a claim, you do not need to complete and return a claim form, and you will still keep your rights to vote on a plan of adjustment and receive payments under the plan. a plan of adjustment is a document that explains how PBa proposes to pay the amounts it owes to its creditors. This plan is available for creditors to review at https://cases.primeclerk.com/puertorico/.

• if you are required to file a claim against PBa, you must do so by July 29, 2020 at 4:00 p.m., atlantic Standard time. a form that you may use to file your claim is provided with this document.

• claims may be filed by (a) electronically filing on the claims agent’s website at https://cases.primeclerk.com/puertorico/ePOc-Index, or (b) mail or hand delivery to the addresses provided in section 6 of this document.

• after reading this document, if you require additional information regarding this notice, you may contact the claims agent at (844) 822-9231 (toll free for u.s. and Puerto rico) or (646) 486-7944 (for international callers), available 10:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m. (atlantic standard Time) (spanish available), or by email at puertoricoinfo@ primeclerk.com. Please note that the people answering the phone number are not able to provide legal advice. If you have questions about your legal rights, including whether you need to file a claim, you should talk to an attorney.

Section 1 – the Bar dates On March 11, 2020 the united states district court for the district of Puerto rico (the “district court”) entered an order (the “Bar date Order”) in the Title III case for PBa in accordance with Bankruptcy rule 3003(c) fixing the following deadlines to file Proofs of claim (collectively, the “Bar dates”): (a) General Bar date: 4:00 p.m. (atlantic Standard time) on July 29, 2020, is the deadline (the “general Bar date”) for filing proofs of claim (as defined in Bankruptcy code section 101(5)), against PBa on account of (i) claims arising, or deemed to have arisen, prior to the commencement of PBa’s Title III case on september 27, 2019, including, for the avoidance of doubt, claims arising under Bankruptcy code section 503(b)(9), and (ii) claims asserted by governmental units (as defined in Bankruptcy code section 101(27)); (b) rejection Bar date: except as otherwise set forth in any order authorizing the rejection of an executory contract or unexpired lease, 4:00 p.m. (atlantic Standard time) on the date that is the later of (i) the General Bar date and (ii) the first business day that is thirty-five (35) calendar days after the entry of an order by the court authorizing such rejection is the deadline for a party to any such rejected executory contract or unexpired lease to file proofs of claim relating to the rejection of such contract or lease (the “rejection Bar date,” and together with the general Bar date, the “Bar dates”); and (c) Bar date if creditor List is amended or Supplemented: If, after the Bar date notice is served, PBa (a) amends its creditor list to reduce a claim and/or to change the classification, nature or characterization of a claim, or (b) supplements its respective creditor list, PBa shall give notice of any amendment or supplement to the holders of claims reduced or changed thereby, and advise such holders they shall each have until the later of (i) the General Bar date and (ii) thirty-five (35) days from the date of such notice to file a proof of claim, or an amended proof of claim, if applicable, or be barred from so doing. as used in this notice, a “claim,” as defined in section 101(5) of the Bankruptcy code, whenever arising, includes any claim against PBa based upon PBa’s primary, secondary,

direct, indirect, fixed, secured, unsecured, contingent, guaranteed, disputed, undisputed, liquidated, unliquidated, matured, unmatured, legal, or equitable liability or otherwise, including, for the avoidance of doubt, claims arising under section 503(b)(9) of the Bankruptcy code (each, a “claim”).

Section 2 – Who is not required to File a Proof of claim the Fact that YoU receiVed thiS notice doeS not Mean that YoU haVe a cLaiM aGainSt PBa or that PBa BeLieVeS YoU haVe a cLaiM. the following persons and entities are not required to file a Proof of claim on or before the applicable Bar date: a. allowed claims: any person or entity whose claim was previously allowed by an order of this court entered on or before the applicable Bar date; B. Paid claims: any person or entity whose claim was paid in full by PBa, including claims paid by PBa after the commencement date of its Title III case; c. Proofs of claim already Filed: any person or entity who already properly filed a proof of claim, which substantially conforms to the Proof of claim Form, in this Title III case with the court or PBa’s claims and noticing agent; d. claims Properly listed and categorized on creditor list: any person or entity whose claim is listed on the creditor list and (i) the claim is not listed as “disputed,” “contingent,” or “unliquidated,” (ii) the person or entity does not dispute the amount and nature of the claim as set forth on the creditor list, and (iii) the person or entity does not dispute that the claim is an obligation of PBa; e. Pension claims: any retiree, active employee, and former employee and any beneficiary of the foregoing persons for accrued pensions and any and all other postretirement benefits due as a result of such person’s employment by or by being a beneficiary of the PBa (“Pension claims”); provided, however, that any such holder should assert a claim not otherwise excepted from filing a proof of claim by Paragraphs a. through l. of this notice by filing a proof of claim with respect to such other claim on or before the general Bar date to avoid disallowance of such other claim; F. union or non-union employee claims: any union-represented or non-union represented employee, furloughed employee, or former employee for compensation and employment benefits, including, without limitation, wages, salaries, employee medical benefits and/or insurance benefits, or workers’ compensation claims (“compensation claims”); provided, however, that compensation claims shall not include claims asserted or to be asserted in any lawsuit or administrative proceeding based on tort or nonemployment-related to common law, statutory law, or regulation even where such claims assert as damages an entitlement to wages, salaries, employee medical benefits and/or insurance benefits; g. Individual union Members’ claims: any person or entity that holds a claim limited to obligations due under their respective collective bargaining agreements, to the extent the relevant union files a master proof of claim on behalf of their respective constituents against PBa (“cBa claims”); provided, however, that any such holder should assert (I) a claim not otherwise excepted from filing a proof of claim by Paragraphs a. through l. of this notice, or (II) a claim for a grievance that has been resolved and liquidated by settlement or arbitration award as of september 27, 2019 (such claim, a “resolved grievance”), by filing a proof of claim with respect to such claim on or before the general Bar date to avoid disallowance of such claim; h. Individual Bondholder claims covered by Timely Filed Bond Master Proof of claim: any person or entity that holds a claim that is limited to the repayment of principal, interest and other fees and expenses, to the extent the relevant indenture trustee, fiscal agent, or similar agent or nominee files a Bond debt Master Proof of claim against the relevant debtor on or before the general Bar date on account of all bond claims against the relevant debtor under the respective trust agreement or bond document; provided, however, that any such holder must assert a claim not otherwise excepted from filing a proof of claim by Paragraphs a. through l. of this section by filing a proof of claim with respect to such other claim on or before the general Bar date to avoid disallowance of such other claim; I. Inter-governmental claims: any municipality, department, or agency of the commonwealth asserting a claim against PBa in an amount less than $100 million. For the avoidance of doubt, any entity asserting a claim against PBa equal to or greater than $100 million must file a proof of claim with respect to such claim on or before the general Bar date to avoid disallowance of such claim; J. administrative expenses: any holder of a claim allowable under Bankruptcy code sections 503(b) and 507(a)(2) as an administrative expense (other than a claim under Bankruptcy code section 503(b)(9)); K. Proofs of claim with separate deadlines: any holder of a claim for which a separate deadline is or has been fixed by this court; and l. Professionals’ administrative claims: Professionals who assert administrative claims for fees and expenses subject to the court’s approval pursuant to PrOMesa section 316. provided, however, that, should the district court fix a date by which the claims described in Paragraphs a. through l. above must be filed, you will be notified of such bar date at the appropriate time.

Section 3 – Who MUSt File a Proof of claim You MUSt file a Proof of claim to vote on any plan of adjustment filed by the Oversight Board on behalf of PBa or to share in any distributions from PBa if you have a claim that arose prior to the commencement date and it is not one of the types of claims described in Paragraphs a. through l. in section 2 above. a holder of a possible claim against PBa should consult an attorney if such holder has any questions regarding this notice, including whether the holder should file a Proof of claim.

Section 4 – consequences of Failure to File a Proof of claim by the applicable Bar date anY hoLder oF a cLaiM that iS not eXcePted FroM the reQUireMentS oF the Bar date order, aS Set Forth in ParaGraPhS a. throUGh L. in Section 2 aBoVe, and that FaiLS to tiMeLY FiLe a ProoF oF cLaiM in the aPProPriate ForM WiLL Be ForeVer Barred (UnLeSS otherWiSe ordered BY the coUrt) FroM aSSertinG SUch cLaiM aGainSt PBa, FroM VotinG on anY PLan oF adJUStMent FiLed in thiS titLe iii caSe, and FroM ParticiPatinG in anY

diStriBUtion in thiS titLe iii caSe on accoUnt oF SUch cLaiM. Section 5 – What to File each Proof of claim, to be properly filed pursuant to this notice, shall: (i) be written in english or spanish; (ii) be denominated in lawful currency of the united states as of the Title III case commencement date; (iii) set forth with specificity the legal and factual basis for the asserted claim; (iv) include a copy of the supporting documentation (or, if such documentation is voluminous, you must attach a summary of such documentation) or an explanation as to why such documentation is not available, with such documentation, summary, or explanation being provided in english or spanish; (v) include an original or electronic signature of the claimant or an authorized agent of the claimant; and (vi) substantially conform to the Proof of claim Form approved by the Bar date Order. If you file a summary of the supporting documentation because they are voluminous, you must transmit the supporting documentation to (a) the claims agent and (b) PBa within ten days after the date of a written request by PBa for such documents.

The Proof of claim Form can be obtained, as well as filed, on the website established and maintained by the claims agent at https://cases.primeclerk.com/puertorico/.

Section 6 – Where and how to File all Proofs of claim, except as otherwise provided for or specifically excepted in section 2 above, shall be filed with the claims and noticing agent, Prime clerk llc (the “claims agent”) pursuant to the procedures provided herein so as to actually be received on or before the applicable Bar date, depending upon the nature of the claim.

Proofs of claim may be filed through any of the following methods: (i) completing the electronic Proof of claim on the claims agent’s website at https:// cases.primeclerk.com/puertorico/ePOc-Index, (ii) if delivered by first class mail, at the following address: commonwealth of Puerto rico, claims Processing center, c/o Prime clerk llc, grand central station, PO Box 4708, new York, nY 10163-4708, (iii) if by overnight courier, at the following address: commonwealth of Puerto rico, claims Processing center, c/o Prime clerk, llc, 850 Third avenue, suite 412, Brooklyn, nY 11232, or (iv) if by hand delivery, at any of the following locations: (a) commonwealth of Puerto rico, claims Processing center, c/o Prime clerk, llc, 850 Third avenue, suite 412, Brooklyn, nY 11232, or (b) the following locations in the commonwealth, available during the listed dates and times: Locations in the commonwealth accepting Proofs of claim by hand delivery3 all locations are available from July 1, 2020 to July 29, 2020 (except weekends and court holidays) commonwealth of Puerto rico claims Processing center c/o Prime clerk, llc 850 Third avenue, suite 412 Brooklyn, nY 11232 Piloto 151 151 san Francisco street, 2nd Floor san Juan, Pr 00901 city Towers 250 Ponce de león ave., suite 503 hato rey, san Juan Pr 00918 Oceana huB center 2 calle acerina caguas, Pr 00725 Joe’s Blue Mcs Building, 1st Floor 880 Tito castro avenue Ponce, Pr 00716-4732 Bianca convention center carr 2 KM 143, 1st Floor añasco, Pr 00610

hours (M-F)

9:00 a.m. – 8:00 p.m. (esT) 8:30 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. (asT) 8:30 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. (asT) 9:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. (asT) 8:30 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. (asT) 8:30 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. (asT)

Proofs of claim sent by facsimile, telecopy, or electronic mail transmission will not be accepted; provided, however, they may be submitted through Prime clerk’s website: https://cases.primeclerk.com/puertorico/ePOc-Index.

Section 7 – additional information PBa’s creditor list and the Bar date Order may be downloaded and examined free of charge from the claims agent website, https://cases.primeclerk.com/puertorico/. any creditor that relies on PBa’s creditor list bears responsibility for determining that its claim is accurately listed therein.

If you require additional information regarding this notice, you may contact the claims agent at (844) 822-9231 (toll free for u.s. and Puerto rico) or (646) 486-7944 (for international callers), available 10:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m. (atlantic standard Time) (spanish available), or by email at puertoricoinfo@primeclerk.com.

The debtors in these Title III cases, along with each debtor’s respective Title III case number and the last four (4) digits of each debtor’s federal tax identification number, as applicable, are the (i) commonwealth of Puerto rico (Bankruptcy case no.

17-BK-3283-lTs) (last Four digits of Federal Tax Id: 3481); (ii) Puerto rico sales Tax Financing corporation (“cOFIna”) (Bankruptcy case no. 17-BK-3284-lTs) (last Four digits of Federal Tax Id: 8474); (iii) Puerto rico highways and Transportation authority (“hTa”) (Bankruptcy case no. 17-BK-3567-lTs) (last Four digits of Federal Tax Id: 3808); (iv) employees retirement system of the government of the commonwealth of Puerto rico (“ers”) (Bankruptcy case no. 17-BK-3566-lTs) (last Four digits of Federal Tax Id: 9686); (v) Puerto rico electric Power authority (“PrePa”) (Bankruptcy case no. 17-BK-4780-lTs) (last Four digits of Federal Tax Id: 3747); and (vi) Puerto rico Public Buildings authority (“PBa”) (Bankruptcy case no. 19-BK-5523-lTs) (last Four digits of Federal Tax Id: 3801) (Title III case numbers are listed as Bankruptcy case numbers due to software limitations).

2 PrOMesa is codified at 48 u.s.c. §§ 2101-2241.

3 PBa reserves the right to amend the locations accepting proofs of claim by hand delivery.

1

The San Juan Daily Star United StateS diStrict coUrt For the diStrict oF PUerto rico

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

17

BaLLotinG MateriaLS to Vote on the deBtorS’ PLan, and in that eVent ShaLL Be Barred FroM aSSertinG the SoLicitation ProcedUreS in connection With the PLan in connection With cLaiMS heLd BY retireMent BeneFiciarieS Were inadeQUate.

In re: Section 4 – What to Submit The FInancIal OversIghT and ManageMenT BOard FOr PuerTO rIcO, PrOMesa Title III each Information Form, to be properly submitted pursuant to this notice, shall: (i) be written in english or no. 17 BK 3283-lTs as representative of spanish; (ii) include an original or electronic signature of the claimant or an authorized agent of the claimant; The cOMMOnWealTh OF PuerTO rIcO, et al., (Jointly administered) and (iii) substantially conform to the Information Form approved by the Pre-solicitation Procedures Order. debtor.1 The Information Form can be obtained, as well as submitted, on the website established and maintained by In re: PrOMesa Title III the claims agent at https://cases.primeclerk.com/puertorico/.

The FInancIal OversIghT and ManageMenT BOard FOr PuerTO rIcO, case no. 17 BK 3566-lTs Section 5 – Where and how to Submit as representative of all Information Forms shall be submitted with the claims and noticing agent, Prime clerk llc (the “claims The eMPlOyees reTIreMenT sysTeM OF The gOvernMenT OF The (Jointly administered) agent”) pursuant to the procedures provided herein so as to actually be received on or before the return date. cOMMOnWealTh OF PuerTO rIcO. Information Forms may be submitted through any of the following methods: debtor. (i) electronically, by completing the Information Form on the claims agent’s website at https://cases. notice oF deadLine For SUBMittinG inForMation ForMS For retireMent primeclerk.com/PrretirementBenefit/ePOc-Index; BeneFiciarieS oF the coMMonWeaLth oF PUerto rico and the eMPLoYeeS retireMent (ii) if delivered by first class mail, at the following address: Puerto rico retirement Benefit Information SYSteM oF the GoVernMent oF the coMMonWeaLth oF PUerto rico Processing center, c/o Prime clerk llc, grand central station, PO Box 4708, new york, ny 10163-4708; (iii) if by overnight courier, at the following address: Puerto rico retirement Benefit Information Processing center, c/o Prime clerk, llc, 850 Third avenue, suite 412, Brooklyn, ny 11232; or to aLL ParticiPantS oF the eMPLoYeeS retireMent SYSteM For the GoVernMent oF (iv) if by hand delivery, at any of the following addresses: (a) Puerto rico retirement Benefit Information the coMMonWeaLth oF PUerto rico (“erS”), the JUdiciarY retireMent SYSteM For the Processing center, c/o Prime clerk, llc, 850 Third avenue, suite 412, Brooklyn, ny 11232; or (b) the coMMonWeaLth oF PUerto rico (“JrS”), and the PUerto rico teacherS retireMent SYSteM following locations in the commonwealth, available during the listed dates and times: (“trS”), PLeaSe taKe notice oF the FoLLoWinG: Locations in the commonwealth The Financial Oversight and Management Board for Puerto rico (the “Oversight Board”) has filed the Title III accepting Proofs of claim by hand delivery5 hours (M-F) Joint Plan of Adjustment of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, et al. [case no. 17-bk-3283, ecF no. 8765] (as all locations are available from July 1, 2020 to July 29, 2020 amended or modified from time to time and including all exhibits thereto, the “Plan”) and a related disclosure (except weekends and court holidays) statement [case no. 17-bk-3283, ecF no. 8766] (as amended or modified from time to time and including commonwealth of Puerto rico claims Processing center all exhibits thereto, the “disclosure statement”) pursuant to which the commonwealth of Puerto rico (the c/o Prime clerk, llc “commonwealth”) (together with ers, the “debtors”) and the Puerto rico Public Buildings authority (“PBa”) 9:00 a.m. – 8:00 p.m. (esT) 850 Third avenue, suite 412 2 seek to adjust their debts under Title III of the Puerto Rico Oversight, Management, and Economic Stability Act. Brooklyn, ny 11232 To solicit certain information from certain holders of retirement benefits claims (“employee claimants”)3 for Piloto 151 which the debtors have incomplete or outdated information, the Oversight Board is providing this notice (the 151 san Francisco street, 2nd Floor 8:30 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. (asT) “notice”), as well as disseminating the notice in publications of widespread circulation, to current and former san Juan, Pr 00901 residents of the commonwealth. city Towers You may be a current or former participant of erS, JrS, or trS, and you may be required to submit 250 Ponce de león ave., suite 503 8:30 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. (asT) a form with information the debtors are currently missing (the “information Form”), including: 4 hato rey, san Juan Pr 00918 (a) name; (b) mailing address; (c) email address; (d) date of birth; (e) gender; (f) social security number ; Oceana huB center and (g) employment information (collectively, the “requested Information”). The debtors request that, 2 calle acerina 9:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. (asT) if at all possible, you submit your Information Form electronically on the website hosted by the debtors’ caguas, Pr 00725 claims and solicitation agent, Prime clerk llc (the “claims agent”), at https://cases.primeclerk.com/ Joe’s Blue PrretirementBenefit/ePOc-Index, or by mail.

Mcs Building, 1st Floor 8:30 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. (asT) oVerVieW – KeY PointS 880 Tito castro avenue • This document is a legal notice concerning the Commonwealth and ERS’s Title III cases.

Ponce, Pr 00716-4732 • the overview on this page describes the key terms of this document. Please read the entire Bianca convention center document carefully for further details. carr 2 KM 143, 1st Floor 8:30 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. (asT) • In a Title III case under PROMESA, certain retirement beneficiaries of the Commonwealth and ERS may be añasco, Pr 00610 entitled to vote on any plan of adjustment filed by the commonwealth and ers. In order for the debtors Information Forms sent by facsimile, telecopy, or electronic mail transmission will not be accepted; to reduce the number of solicitation packages returned undeliverable, and ensure the claim amounts for such beneficiaries are accurately calculated, the debtors are requesting that certain claimants submit provided, however, they may be submitted through Prime clerk’s website: https://cases.primeclerk.com/ an Information Form containing the requested Information. This document explains how to submit PrretirementBenefit/ePOc-Index.

The Debtors request that, if at all possible, you submit your Information Form electronically on the Claims Information Forms.

Agent’s website or by mail.

• A plan of adjustment is a document that explains how the Debtors propose to pay the amounts it owes to its Section 6 – additional information creditors. This plan is available for creditors to review at https://cases.primeclerk.com/puertorico/.

The Pre-solicitation Procedures Order may be downloaded and examined free of charge from the claims • if you are required to submit an information Form, you must do so by July 29, 2020 at 4:00 p.m., agent website, https://cases.primeclerk.com/puertorico/. atlantic Standard time. an Information Form is provided with this document.

If you require additional information regarding this notice, you may contact the claims agent at (844) 822• Information Forms may be submitted by (a) electronically submitting on the Claims Agent’s website at https://cases.primeclerk.com/PrretirementBenefit/ePOc-Index, or (b) mail or hand delivery to the 9231 (toll free for u.s. and Puerto rico) or (646) 486-7944 (for international callers), available 10:00 a.m. to 7:00 addresses provided in section 5 of this document. the debtors request that, if at all possible, you p.m. (atlantic standard Time) (spanish available), or by email at puertoricoinfo@primeclerk.com.

1 submit your information Form electronically on the claims agent’s website or by mail.

The debtors in these Title III cases, along with each debtor’s respective Title III case number and the last four • After reading this document, if you require additional information regarding this Notice, you may contact (4) digits of each debtor’s federal tax identification number, as applicable, are the (i) commonwealth of Puerto the claims agent at (844) 822-9231 (toll free for u.s. and Puerto rico) or (646) 486-7944 (for international rico (Bankruptcy case no. 17-BK-3283-lTs) (last Four digits of Federal Tax Id: 3481); (ii) Puerto rico sales callers), available 10:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m. (atlantic standard Time) (spanish available), or by email at Tax Financing corporation (“cOFIna”) (Bankruptcy case no. 17-BK-3284-lTs) (last Four digits of Federal Tax puertoricoinfo@primeclerk.com. Please note that the people answering the phone number are not able to Id: 8474); (iii) Puerto rico highways and Transportation authority (“hTa”) (Bankruptcy case no. 17-BK-3567provide legal advice. If you have questions about your legal rights, including whether you need to submit an lTs) (last Four digits of Federal Tax Id: 3808); (iv) employees retirement system of the government of the Information Form, you should talk to an attorney. commonwealth of Puerto rico (“ers”) (Bankruptcy case no. 17-BK-3566-lTs) (last Four digits of Federal Tax Id: 9686); (v) Puerto rico electric Power authority (“PrePa”) (Bankruptcy case no. 17-BK-4780-lTs) (last Four Section 1 – the return date On March 18, 2020, the united states district court for the district of Puerto rico (the “district court”) entered digits of Federal Tax Id: 3747); and (vi) Puerto rico Public Buildings authority (“PBa”) (Bankruptcy case no. an order (the “Pre-solicitation Procedures Order”) in the debtors’ Title III cases fixing the deadlines to submit 19-BK-5523-lTs) (last Four digits of Federal Tax Id: 3801) (Title III case numbers are listed as Bankruptcy case numbers due to software limitations).

Information Forms by 4:00 p.m. (atlantic Standard time) on July 29, 2020 (the “return date”).

2 PrOMesa is codified at 48 u.s.c. §§ 2101–2241.

Section 2 – Who MUSt Submit an information Form 3 In the Plan filed at case no. 17-bk-3283, ecF no. 11946, class 39 constitutes the claims of employee If you are an employee claimant, you MUSt submit an information Form, or the debtors may be unable to claimants. The class number(s) constituting the claims of employee claimants may change in any solicit your vote on the plan of adjustment filed by the Oversight Board on behalf of the debtors. a holder of a possible claim against the debtors should consult an attorney if such holder has any subsequently filed Plan.

4 The debtors seek to obtain the last four digits of claimants’ social security numbers in order to match questions regarding this notice, including whether the holder should submit an information Form. claimants with their employee records.

Section 3 – consequences of Failure to Submit an information Form by the return date 5 The debtors reserve the right to amend the locations accepting proofs of claim by hand delivery. anY hoLder oF a cLaiM Who FaiLS to tiMeLY SUBMit an inForMation ForM MiGht not receiVe

FINAL REMINDER

18

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

The San Juan Daily Star

At least 60 migrants killed in Turkish boat disaster

By THE NEW YORK TIMES

T

urkish rescue teams have retrieved the bodies of 60 migrants after their boat sank in a lake in the east of the country, Turkish media reported Monday, in one of the worst disasters involving migrants in Turkey in recent years.

The boat capsized late at night June 27 with as many as 80 people on board, and the confirmed death toll has climbed steadily since then. At least two children were reported to be among the dead.

The accident occurred on Lake Van, a large inland lake in eastern Turkey, near the border with Iran. The migrants were crossing the lake on a fishing boat in an apparent attempt to avoid police checkpoints on the highways, on their journey toward western Turkey.

Early reports indicated some of the dead may have been Afghans and Pakistanis. Families from Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iran have started reaching out for information, said Mahmut Kacan, a lawyer who heads the migrant committee at the Van Bar Association.

For more than a year, migration officials have been reporting unusually large numbers of people crossing illegally

into Turkey and trying to reach Europe, warning that the figures are creeping back toward the levels seen at the height of the migration crisis in 2015.

Turkey apprehended 60,000 migrants last year, double the number in 2018. The numbers kept climbing early this year, then fell in April and May, when the country was largely under lockdown because of the coronavirus pandemic, and only authorized motorists were allowed on the roads.

But as the lockdown was lifted in June, the numbers began to rise again.

Turkey’s interior minister, Suleyman Soylu, said more than 4,500 migrants had been apprehended already this year in the eastern Van region, and thousands more had been stopped at the border with Iran. Most came from Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran and African countries, he said earlier this month.

The Turkish coast guard reported intercepting more than 9,000 migrants at sea in the first three months of this year — nearly three times as many as the same period last year. In January alone, 4,000 migrants were found, compared with 1,000 in January 2019.

“People are still trying, and they always will whether there is a pandemic or not,” said Lanna Walsh, spokesperson

Turkey launched a search-and-rescue mission after a boat carrying migrants across Lake Van was reported missing on June 27.

for the International Organization for Migration in Turkey.

But even as the flow of people into Turkey grows, the number of migrants crossing from there into Europe has fallen dramatically, largely thanks to aggressive pushbacks by Greece.

In the first six months of this year, 11,900 illegal crossings by migrants were detected in the eastern Mediterranean region, barely half the number detected in the same period last year, Frontex, the European border and coast guard agency, reported last week. Only 200 were detected in June, one of the lowest totals recorded for that month since 2009.

There were 70 to 80 people aboard the ill-fated boat on Lake Van, according to a statement given to military police by one of the men accused of trying to ferry them across the water. The statement, attributed to Medeni Akbas and seen in written form by The New York Times, said the group included one or two children and five or six women.

Akbas is the only survivor found so far. A relative of his, Servet Akbas, is still among the missing.

Akbas has been arrested, along with four others, and arrest warrants have been issued for 17 more people. His statement says his relative asked him to join him in smuggling the migrants across the lake and offered him $110 to mind the boat’s engine and help if fights broke out among the passengers.

His relative was steering the boat when a wave hit it from the side and overturned it, throwing half the passengers into the water and trapping others under the hull, he said.

He held on to one of the migrant’s bags and managed to stay afloat until the early hours of the next day. Servet Akbas was with him in the water but died, and Medeni Akbas said he could not hold on to his body and had to let him go.

He called his family when he reached the shore.

Thirteen bodies were found in the lake soon after the accident, before the wreckage was located. Since then, Turkish officials have been using a submersible device to retrieve bodies from the wreck, which is lying at a depth of about 350 feet, the Demiroren news agency reported.

Twenty-five of the dead are Afghan, according to an Afghan Embassy official, the BBC reported. The lawyer in Van, Kacan, said that families in touch with him had given him names of people thought to be on the boat.

“So far names of nine refugees were transmitted to us,’’ he said by telephone. “We will be presenting them to the prosecutor’s office.”

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

19

Trump’s occupation of American cities has begun

Federal agents confronting Black Lives Matter protesters in Portland, Ore., on Monday.

By MICHELLE GOLDBERG

T

he month after Donald Trump’s inauguration, Yale historian Timothy Snyder published the bestselling book “On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons From the Twentieth Century.” It was part of a small flood of titles meant to help Americans find their bearings as the new president laid siege to liberal democracy.

One of Snyder’s lessons was, “Be wary of paramilitaries.”

He wrote, “When the pro-leader paramilitary and the official police and military intermingle, the end has come.” In 2017, the idea of unidentified agents in camouflage snatching leftists off the streets without warrants might have seemed like a febrile Resistance fantasy. Now it’s happening.

According to a lawsuit filed Friday by Oregon’s attorney general, Ellen Rosenblum, federal agents “have been using unmarked vehicles to drive around downtown Portland, detain protesters, and place them into the officers’ unmarked vehicles” since at least last Tuesday. The protesters are neither arrested nor told why they’re being held.

There’s no way to know the affiliation of all the agents — they’ve been wearing military fatigues with patches that just say “Police” — but The Times reported that some of them are part of a Border Patrol group “that normally is tasked with investigating drug smuggling organizations.”

The Trump administration has announced that it intends to send a similar force to other cities; on Monday, the Chicago Tribune reported on plans to deploy about 150 federal agents to Chicago. “I don’t need invitations by the state,” Chad Wolf, acting secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, said on Fox News on Monday, adding, “We’re going to do that whether they like us there or not.”

In Portland, we see what such an occupation looks like.

Oregon Public Broadcasting reported on 29-year-old Mark Pettibone, who early last Wednesday was grabbed off the street by unidentified men, hustled into an unmarked minivan and taken to a holding cell in the federal courthouse. He was eventually released without learning who had abducted him.

A federal agent shot 26-year-old Donavan La Bella in the head with an impact munition; he was hospitalized and needed reconstructive surgery. In a widely circulated video, a 53-yearold Navy veteran was pepper sprayed and beaten after approaching federal agents to ask them about their oaths to the Constitution, leaving him with two broken bones.

There’s something particularly terrifying in the use of Border Patrol agents against American dissidents. After the attack on protesters near the White House last month, the military pushed back on Trump’s attempts to turn it against the citizenry. Police officers in many cities are willing to brutalize demonstrators, but they’re under local control. U.S. Customs and Border Protection, however, is under federal authority, has leadership that’s fanatically devoted to Trump and is saturated with far-right politics.

“It doesn’t surprise me that Donald Trump picked CBP to be the ones to go over to Portland and do this,” Rep. Joaquin Castro, D-Texas, told me. “It has been a very problematic agency in terms of respecting human rights and in terms of respecting the law.”

It is true that CBP is not an extragovernmental militia, and so might not fit precisely into Snyder’s “On Tyranny” schema. But when I spoke to Snyder on Monday, he suggested the distinction isn’t that significant. “The state is allowed to use force, but the state is allowed to use force according to rules,” he said. These agents, operating outside their normal roles, are by all appearances behaving lawlessly.

Snyder pointed out that the history of autocracy offers several examples of border agents being used against regime enemies. “This is a classic way that violence happens in authoritarian regimes, whether it’s Franco’s Spain or whether it’s the Russian Empire,” Snyder said. “The people who are getting used to committing violence on the border are then brought in to commit violence against people in the interior.”

Castro worries that since the agents are unidentified, farright groups could easily masquerade as them to go after their enemies on the left. “It becomes more likely the more that this tactic is used,” he said.

On Friday, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi tweeted about what’s happening in Portland: “Trump and his storm troopers must be stopped.” She didn’t mention what Congress plans to do to stop them, but the House will soon vote on a homeland security appropriations bill. People outraged about the administration’s police-state tactics should demand, at a minimum, that Congress hold up the department’s funding until those tactics are halted.

Through the Trump years, there’s been a debate about whether the president’s authoritarianism is tempered by his incompetence. Those who think concern about fascism is overblown can cite several instances when the administration has been beaten back after overreaching. But all too often the White House has persevered, deforming American life until what once seemed like worst-case scenarios become the status quo.

Trump has established that his allies, like Michael Flynn and Roger Stone, are above the law. What happens now will tell us how many of us are below it.

PO BOX 6537 Caguas PR 00726 Telephones: (787) 743-3346 • (787) 743-6537 (787) 743-5606 • Fax (787) 743-5100

Dr. Ricardo Angulo Publisher Manuel Sierra

Ray Ruiz

General Manager

Legal Notice Director

María de L. Márquez

Sharon Ramírez

Business Director

Legal Notices Graphics Manager

R. Mariani

Elsa Velázquez

Circulation Director

Reporter

Lisette Martínez

María Rivera

Advertising Agency Director

Graphic Artist Manager

20

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

Tras investigación a la gobernadora, presidente del Senado investigará al FEI Por THE STAR l presidente del Senado Thomas RiEla investigación vera Schatz, dijo el martes, que ante que el Panel sobre el

Fiscal Especial Independiente (PFEI) realiza a la gobernadora Wanda Vázquez Garced, estableció que el Senado hará lo propio contra el PFEI. “La manera en que el Panel del Fiscal Especial Independiente ha manejado esto, exponiendo a una persona a 20 días de una primaria con unas alegaciones vagas y generales no es la manera correcta. Yo exigí y exijo que el Panel del Fiscal Especial Independiente diga categóricamente y claramente qué le imputan a la gobernadora”, dijo Rivera Schatz.

“Si la gobernadora cometió algún delito, que lo digan. Que hablen con claridad”, añadió quien recordó que no es la primera vez que el FEI investiga a Vázquez Garced.

Se trata de una resolución que había presentado el presidente de la Co-

misión de Gobierno en el Senado, Carmelo Ríos para investigar al PFEI. “El pueblo tiene derecho a conocer las imputaciones que se hagan contra personas que participan en eventos electorales para que puedan evaluar en su justa perspectiva, si la persona merece o no su voto”, dijo.

Mencionó que “levanta suspicacia” que solo dos fiscales del panel del FEI –“en ausencia de un tercero”- sean quienes suscriban la resolución.

“El panel del FEI no es Poncio Pilato. Que no venga nadie en el FEI a lavarse las manos. Poncio Pilato tuvo su lugar en la historia y el panel del FEI y los actores del panel del FEI tendrán la suya”, expuso el presidente senatorial.

“Voy a darle acción a esta investigación que pidió el compañero Carmelo Ríos en un tiempo, porque, de la misma manera en que le exigí a la licenciada Wandymar Burgos que se fuera y consulté a los compañeros de mayoría para que apoyaran la decisión de que si no se iba, íbamos a convo-

car a una sesión para proceder, corresponde hacerlo ahora también”, dijo el también presidente del Partido Nuevo Progresista (PNP).

Rivera Schatz le hizo el reclamo a la presidenta del PFEI, Nydia Cotto Vives para que exprese de inmediato los detalles sobre las imputaciones a la gobernadora Wanda Vázquez Garced.

“Si alguien violó la ley, que pague. El que sea”, dijo Rivera Schatz al añadir que “cuando queda un sabor que alguien está usando el poder para desquitarse de manera personal, cuando queda el sabor de que alguien está usando el poder par adelantar causas políticas, el pueblo de Puerto Rico no está conforme”.

Empleados de la UPR aseguran la gobernadora les mintió y exigen acción a la legislatura THE STAR Pornidos en una sola voz, gremios de trabajadores U de la Universidad de Puerto Rico (UPR) y la Junta de Sistema de Retiro de la UPR condenaron hoy

que la gobernadora Wanda Vázquez Garced no incluyera en la agenda de la sesión legislativa convocada ayer el Proyecto de la Cámara 2572, que busca extender a rango de ley su retiro, y exigieron acción de los líderes legislativos.

“La gobernadora nuevamente traiciona a los universitarios, no dando paso a que el PC 2572 sea considerado. Este proyecto, de la autoría de la representante Lourdes Ramos, fue creado con el consenso de todos los gremios universitarios para dar una protección a nuestro retiro y evitar que quede en manos de una Junta de Gobierno que desea destruirlo para convertirlo en planes 401K, expuestos a los vaivenes del mercado”, plantearon.

“Reclamamos a ambos líderes legislativos, de Cámara y Senado, y a la gobernadora que incluyan el proyecto 2572 para aprobación en la próxima sesión extraordinaria. Muchas veces dicen que el pueblo es primero, ahora es una buena oportunidad de demostrarlo”, afirmaron en una declaración conjunta.

Ayer, flanqueada por el presidente del Senado, Thomas Rivera Schatz, y su homólogo en la Cámara, Carlos ‘Johnny’ Méndez, Vázquez Garced anunció los proyectos a ser incluidos en la sesión legislativa extraordinaria que dará inicios esta semana. En nin-

gún momento mencionó la inclusión del PC 2572.

“No nos cabe duda que con esta actitud, la gobernadora demuestra falta de compromiso con los universitarios y una vendetta dirigida a la destrucción de la UPR. El PC 2572 no tiene ningún impacto económico en el pueblo ni en el gobierno, lo que busca es regir la manera en que se administrará el retiro de los empleados y atender cómo la administración universitaria vendrá llamada a realizar sus aportaciones y pagar la deuda que mantiene actualmente con el Sistema de Retiro UPR”, detallaron los líderes sindicales del principal centro educativo del país.

Anteriormente la gobernadora había vetado la RC 655, también de la representante Ramos, proyecto que evitaba que la Junta de Gobierno UPR se aprovechara de la pandemia para destruir el retiro sin la consulta de los universitarios. Entonces, la gobernadora dio su palabra a la representante Ramos Rivera de que, de prepararse un proyecto de consenso, lo aprobaría y que consultaría en caso de tener dudas. Sin embargo, nada de esto pasó. “Nuevamente Vázquez le da la espalda a la universidad de Puerto Rico y a todos sus empleados, tanto activos como jubilados, faltándole a la palabra empeñada. Vivimos en un gobierno de mentiras que no le importa impactar negativamente a más de 19,000 familias”, lamentaron los trabajadores.

Advirtieron que, si deja a merced de la Junta de Gobierno de la UPR las decisiones de retiro y la congelación del Sistema, la gobernadora será cómplice de la futura insolvencia del Fondo y provocará

que eventualmente, al no haber dinero, la UPR o el gobierno central tengan que absorber los pagos de pensiones. “No nos cabe duda de la traición, la falta de compromiso y transparencia. Mientras indica en su mensaje de presupuesto que defenderá la UPR e inyectará el Sistema de Retiro, nos da otra estocada dejando el proyecto que recoge su promesa en el aire”, recalcaron Alomar y Buxó.

Los gremios también denuncian cómo Vázquez Garced se ha hecho de la vista larga con los nombramientos vencidos de los licenciados Walter Alomar y Zoraida Buxó. Los universitarios han sido enérgicos reclamando la falta de compromiso de estos funcionarios y cómo sus decisiones desacertadas degradan cada día más la UPR. “Tenemos una Junta de Gobierno que no responde a los intereses de los universitarios, completamente hermética y que se ha dedicado, junto a la alta gerencia administrativa de la Universidad, a otorgar contratos a amigos del alma, a crear vicepresidencias innecesarias y a gastar el poco presupuesto disponible en gastos totalmente innecesarios. Los términos de estos verdugos vencieron desde abril, y aun así los tienen en sus sillas tomando decisiones en detrimento de toda la comunidad universitaria”, denunciaron.

“Exigimos a la gobernadora que tome acción a favor de la UPR y que cumpla su palabra sacando a estos señores de la JG y nombrando a personas serias, con compromiso hacia el primer centro docente del País, así como, incluyendo el PC 2572 en la extraordinaria”.

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

21

Producer takes Academy to task in lawsuit

By BROOKS BARNES

T

ension within the stately Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences spilled into public Monday when a prominent producer sued the organization over a procedural matter and in the process attacked officials over the troubled state of the Oscars.

Michael Shamberg, a producer and executive producer of “The Big Chill” (1983), “Erin Brockovich” (2000), “Django Unchained” (2012) and other films, filed the lawsuit in Los Angeles County Superior Court.

It claims that the academy did not adhere to its rules when its 54-member board declined to vote on bylaw amendments proposed by Shamberg. In conjunction with the filing, Shamberg, who unsuccessfully ran for an academy board seat in June, publicly admonished the organization, a rarity for a member of the Hollywood establishment.

“The place is being run into the ground,” Shamberg said in an interview, referring to the academy.

“They think if they don’t talk about problems they will go away. I’m tired of it.”

According to his complaint, Shamberg in January formally proposed amending the 93-year-old academy’s bylaws to put a greater focus on engaging movie buffs through social media. He also asked the organization to conduct an annual survey of members, in part to solicit ideas about how to make the Oscars more relevant to young adults and to give members a way to have their voices heard. Television ratings for the most recent Academy Awards plunged 31% among viewers 18 to 49 compared with the previous year, according to

Michael Shamberg has been a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences since 1981.

Nielsen data.

An academy spokeswoman declined to comment.

Scott Miller, the academy’s general counsel, defended the board’s handling of the proposed amendments in a July 10 letter to Shamberg’s lawyer. Miller said Shamberg received “abundant consideration” in processing and reviewing his proposal, noting that the producer had presented his proposal, titled the Relevance Project, to the board in person.

“The fact that Mr. Shamberg disagrees with the academy’s social media strategy does not mean the board has

failed to exercise reasonable business judgment in that area,” Miller wrote. “And it does not mean Mr. Shamberg is entitled to supplant their judgment with his.”

Total viewership for the Oscars telecast has declined 43% over the last decade. (To compare, the Golden Globes have increased by about 7%.) Various attempts by the academy to prop up the Oscars — shortening the televised portion of the ceremony by excluding certain categories, adding a category for achievement in “popular” film — have been poorly introduced and ultimately scrapped.

Shamberg, 75, said the academy could improve the fortunes of the Oscars if it had a sharper, speedier and more emotional presence on Instagram and Twitter, among other platforms. He said the academy should be in the league of a National Geographic, which has 140 million followers on Instagram, or a Nike, which has 117 million. The academy’s account has 2.6 million followers and largely posts archival stills and images of celebrities on red carpets. Shamberg called the organization’s voice in social media posts “bland and formulaic.”

“It is the academy’s stubborn refusal to engage the audience on social media that dooms the Oscars to a has-been awards show,” he wrote in a June 30 email to the board. “None of you filmmakers, publicists or studio executives would approve a digital marketing campaign for one of your movies that is as bland and all over the map as academy posts.”

He added, “It’s time for the academy and the board of governors to step up and publicly admit that the Oscars are in crisis.”

For some artists, election season means ‘enough of Trump’

By ZACHARY SMALL

V

oters heading to the polls this election season in battleground states like Michigan and Pennsylvania may find themselves facing billboards, projections and even cornfield cutouts designed by the country’s leading artists with a simple refrain: Enough is enough.

“We are at a precipice in this country, and we are either going to move forward, or we are not,” said artist Carrie Mae Weems, who has created artworks for the “Enough of Trump” initiative alongside nearly a dozen other influential artists like Deborah Kass, Jeffrey Gibson and Shepard Fairey in collaboration with the nonprofit People for the American Way, a progressive advocacy group started by television producer Norman Lear.

The organization plans to exhibit its collection of nearly two dozen artworks across the country this fall as Americans decide who their next president will be.

“Art has the power to connect with people’s hearts as well as their minds,” said Lear, who helped found the organization in 1980 to oppose the growing political power of such right-wing religious groups as televangelist Jerry Falwell’s Moral Majority. “This campaign will get people thinking and talking and feeling in their guts how much they’ve had enough of this president. And we’ll remind them that the only remedy for that is to vote.”

The Trump campaign has yet to announce any similar initiatives and did not respond to an inquiry about it from The New York Times. However, artist Jon McNaughton, a supporter, has continued to paint widely circulated images favorable to the president, including a recent one of Trump’s face added to the side of Mount Rushmore.

For LaToya Ruby Frazier, the choice to participate in the “Enough of Trump” initiative was a personal one. Included in her submissions is an aerial photograph of the steel mill that dominates the skyline of her hometown, Braddock, Pennsyl-

vania. She attributes her own autoimmune disorder to pollution from the factory and hopes that a new president will reverse the Trump administration’s rollback of environmental rules. “We should be using our votes to think of others,” she said. “Nobody can escape politics.”

Artist Ed Ruscha sees his own contribution as joining a rich history of political posters designed by artists wanting to protect liberal values. That includes Andy Warhol’s “Vote McGovern” screen print created for George McGovern’s 1972 presidential bid against Richard Nixon. Ruscha’s poster, which features a shredded American flag and a frame of phrases referencing hot-button issues like abortion and immigration, is also being sold in a signed limited edition of 50 for $2,000 each to support the nonprofit organization’s election work.

“This is my way of throwing my hat in the ring, and it’s because I don’t see any social progress in these last four years,” Ruscha said.

22

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

The San Juan Daily Star

Without music, Tanglewood is empty, eerie and beautiful

Visitors enjoy the grounds of Tanglewood Music Center which remain open though live programming has been canceled, in Lenox, Mass., on July 16, 2020.

By MELENA RYZIK

A

ndré Bernard was 3 months old when he attended his first concert at Tanglewood: Benny Goodman playing Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto, in 1956. For nearly every one of the next 63 years, he has made a pilgrimage to the lush, sprawling lawn of this summer music mecca here in the Berkshires.

He has had a routine. Start off on the grass, ears peeled for the bell that signaled the show was about to begin. Then migrate to the Shed, the main concert hall, open on the sides. Watch the moths dart above the brasses and bows, fluttering up to the lights. Yo-Yo Ma, Leonard Bernstein, Aaron Copland, Jessye Norman, Ray Charles, The Who: Bernard has seen them all here.

But he will not be able to add to that list this year. The coronavirus pandemic has forced the cancellation of Tanglewood, just as it has wiped out so many other beloved summer rituals: the blockbuster in the air-conditioned multiplex, the waterfront arts festival, the sweaty stadium pop extravaganza. Throughout the country, resonant seasonal pleasures have vanished.

The loss of Tanglewood, the summer home of the Boston Symphony Orchestra since 1937, hits particularly hard here in bucolic western Massachusetts, where the festival takes place on 524 rolling acres. Many fans, like Bernard, the vice president and secretary of the John Simon

Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, have been attending for decades. (Bernard practically grew up in the wings: His father played the viola in the Boston Symphony.)

The rehearsal, lecture and concert calendar has been these devoted fans’ organizing principle; second homes were bought just to be nearby. They pinned their summers to Tanglewood, which normally attracts up to 350,000 people each season.

So what is the Berkshires without Tanglewood? Relaxed? Scenic? Yes. But also empty, eerie and very much on hold.

“It’s been quiet as anything,” said Barry Sheridan, a retired doctor who lives nearby. “It’s very sad.” Losing a year of activity when you’re younger is one thing, he added, but at his age, 85, time is more precious: “You’re not sure if there will be a next year.”

Tanglewood is the crown jewel — “the granddaddy,” Bernard called it — of a Berkshires cultural calendar that also includes the Jacob’s Pillow dance festival; the Williamstown Theater Festival; another theater festival, Shakespeare and Company; and the FreshGrass bluegrass music festival at Mass MoCA. All were canceled — a brutal shortchanging for a region dependent on tourism.

The Boston Symphony has been streaming some performances online, but its revenue loss from Tanglewood’s cancellation amounts to $16.3 million, according to a spokeswoman, though some of that loss has been

mitigated by ticket donations and reduced expenses. (It is only the second time in the festival’s 83-year history that it hasn’t presented any live music; the other was in 1943, during World War II.) A 2017 study by an economics professor at Williams College found that Tanglewood brings in over $100 million a year in economic benefits to the region, boosting hotels, museums and other businesses. Last year, the festival opened a new education facility on its grounds — with rehearsal space for musicians and programming for adults — that was meant to expand its reach even further.

In a normal summer, Lenox, a town of art galleries and upscale boutiques in historic buildings, would be awash in traffic and window shoppers; couples jockeying for a table at Zinc, a French bistro; day-trippers and health seekers from retreats like Canyon Ranch and Kripalu, a yoga center; and, late at night, performers and production crews gathering over drinks to rehash the evening’s shows.

The sense of creativity and community was “electric,” said Tony Chojnowski, who owns four shops in Lenox and has often found himself in a midnight coterie of artists and dancers.

The coronavirus outbreak seems to be under control in Massachusetts, which is further along than most states in its reopening; it has even allowed indoor dining. But visitors are still sparse.

Chojnowski said foot traffic was down as much as 70% at his flagship boutique, Casablanca. “We’re canceling fall orders,” he said. “The cash flow isn’t there.” In the spring, when brick-and-mortar stores were shut, he began reaching out to his clientele to see how they were holding up. “I made probably 300 or 400 phone calls,” he said.

“I’m hopeful we’ll be able to stay open.”

For those locals and the visitors who have reappeared, there are still pleasures in the verdant landscape, dotted with organic farms, hiking trails and spots to canoe and kayak. That is especially true for otherwise locked-in city dwellers and suburbanites.

“It’s like your eyes are drinking in the scenery,” said Ellen Abelove, a social worker from Long Island, who, with her husband, was trying to entice others to join them in the Berkshires. “I keep texting my friends: ‘We’re here!’”

Though indoor dining is an option, restaurants in Lenox and adjacent towns like Great Barrington and Stockbridge have created expansive outdoor setups, and streets are now lined with pop-up tents, like a long stretch of backyard weddings.

Recently reopened hotels are filled to their newly reduced capacities; bit by bit, institutions like Mass MoCA are reviving, with timed tickets. The Berkshire Theater Group even got permission from Actors’ Equity to stage live theater in August.

And Tanglewood is, in fact, still open — to registered visitors, as a park: 1,341 people have signed up.

Bernard was one of those who visited the grounds. “I found it a little haunting,” he said. “It’s a little, for me, like going back to the place I grew up. And I’d like to remember it the way it was.”

The San Juan Daily Star The San Juan Daily Star

20

Wednesday, March 4, 2020

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

23

FASHION The San Juan Daily Star

American Fashion nominates the Designers of the Year. They really make you think.

By VANESSA FRIEDMAN

W

hen the coronavirus prompted the Council of Fashion Designers of America to postpone the 2020 CFDA Fashion Awards, the annual “Oscars of the Fashion World” (industry prom) originally scheduled for June 8, it seemed like another glittering evening of voyeurism and celebration had fallen to the pandemic.

On Monday, however, the organization revealed that while the party may be over, at least for this year, the concept would go on.

“In this time of unprecedented challenge and change for our industry, we feel very strongly that it is important to recognize the nominees representing the best of fashion creativity,” Tom Ford, chairman of the CFDA, said in a news release. It announced the names, and said winners would be named on Sept.

14, the start of New York Fashion Week.

Kerby Jean-Raymond at the spring 2019 Pyer Moss show in New York, Sept. 8, 2018.

Virgil Abloh, artistic director of Louis Vuitton’s men’s wear, with Gigi Hadid, at the 2019 CFDAs in New York, June 3, 2019.

And the nominees are …?

Almost exactly the same designers who have been nominated (and won) in years past. Which means that rather than demonstrate the strength and resilience and depth of imagination of American fashion, the award nomination list mostly revealed exactly what is wrong with it. Or some of it.

In a time when the system itself is under scrutiny in a multitude of ways — from the way its constant churn of collections and shows devalues creations to its racism — nominating a handful of very familiar names as the very best fashion has to offer simply serves to perpetrate that system.

For anyone taken aback by the recent news that it was only this month that a Black photographer was chosen to shoot Vanity Fair’s cover, or that since Tyler Mitchell became the first Black

photographer to shoot a Vogue cover in 2018, there hasn’t been another; for anyone thinking that the fashion industry is rife with cronyism, entrenched gatekeepers reluctant to give up power and a deep investment in maintaining the velvet-roped-off status quo, this list of nominees gives substance to the allegations.

Simply consider the fact that the nominees for the three big awards are: American Womenswear Designer of the Year: Ashley Olsen and Mary-Kate Olsen for the Row, Brandon Maxwell, Gabriela Hearst, Marc Jacobs and Tom Ford.

American Menswear Designer of the Year: Emily Adams Bode for Bode, Kerby Jean-Raymond for Pyer Moss, Thom Browne, Todd Snyder and Tom Ford.

American Accessories Designer of the Year: the Olsens again, Gabriela Hearst, Jennifer Fisher for Jennifer Fisher Jewelry, Stuart Vevers for Coach and Telfar Clemens for Telfar.

And consider that, of the above, Ford has not only won a Lifetime Achievement Award (in 2014), which should, it seems to me, disqualify the winner from being nominated again, but has already won six other CFDA awards.

Jacobs has also won a Lifetime Achievement Award, as well as seven others. Browne, who has won the men’s award three times, has been nominated for it every year since 2013.

The Row has won the accessory award three times, and the womenswear award once. Maxwell won the women’s award last year, and the emerging designer award in 2016. (Bode won that last year.)

Jean-Raymond and Clemens were nominated for the same awards last year, and both have won the CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund. Snyder has been nominated multiple times.

I could go on with almost every name, but you get the idea.

Even the Global Awards, now expanded to include both menswear and womenswear — which were created to enlarge

the nominee base and make a night that can feel stiflingly parochial reflect the reality of an international industry — feels stuck in a rut created when the world was a very different place.

Which it was, since the nominations were received before March 13, when COVID-19 was just beginning to penetrate everyone’s consciousness.

For womenswear, after all, there are Daniel Lee for Bottega Veneta, who won four — count ’em — awards at the Fashion Awards in London last December; Dries Van Noten; Miuccia Prada for Prada; Pierpaolo Piccioli for Valentino and Rick Owens.

Who has also won the Lifetime Achievement Award in the past.

For men’s, there are Craig Green, Dries Van Noten, Jonathan Anderson for Loewe, Kim Jones for Dior and Virgil Abloh for Louis Vuitton.

I am not saying that the nominees — chosen by CFDA Fashion Awards Guild, which is made up of CFDA members, retailers, journalists (not from The New York Times; our rules prohibit us from voting in such industry competitions) and stylists — are not genuinely talented or that they haven’t built impressive and potent businesses. They are, very much, and they have.

They deserve respect and applause, though perhaps not multiple statuettes.

But Ford is right in saying this is a time of unprecedented challenge, of questioning. So why not question, and change, these awards, too?

The CFDA awards are potent fundraisers for an organization that does meaningful work fighting on the front lines for fashion’s causes: intellectual property protection, immigration, education. The group is helping a whole swath of designers weather the shutdown. Their awards should not be abolished.

But maybe they can become something more than simply notches in a designer’s belt, or an insider’s club that may feel, to those looking in, like a secretive fashion cabal.

If we are rethinking everything, it certainly would seem to be the simplest way to start. No one was expecting the awards to happen at all. The nominee announcement came as a surprise.

Just imagine if it had been a real one.

Ashley Olsen, left, and Mary-Kate Olsen at the 2019 CFDAs in New York, June 3, 2019.

24

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

During Coronavirus lockdowns, some doctors wondered: Where are the preemies?

A premature newborn at Burnley General Teaching Hospital in east Lancashire, England, in May. Doctors have noted a drop in preterm births during the lockdowns.

By ELIZABETH PRESTON

T

his spring, as countries around the world told people to stay home to slow the spread of the coronavirus, doctors in neonatal intensive care units were noticing something strange: Premature births were falling, in some cases drastically.

It started with doctors in Ireland and Denmark. Each team, unaware of the other’s work, crunched the numbers from its own region or country and found that during the lockdowns, premature births — especially the earliest, most dangerous cases — had plummeted. When they shared their findings, they heard similar anecdotal reports from other countries.

They don’t know what caused the drop in premature births and can only speculate as to the factors in lockdown that might have contributed. But further research might help doctors, scientists and parents-to-be understand the causes of premature birth and ways to prevent it, which have been elusive until now. Their studies are not yet peer-reviewed and have been posted only on preprint servers. In some cases the changes amounted to only a few missing babies per hospital. But they

represented significant reductions from the norm, and some experts in premature birth think the research is worthy of additional investigation.

“These results are compelling,” said Dr. Denise Jamieson, an obstetrician at Emory University’s School of Medicine in Atlanta.

About 1 in 10 U.S. babies is born early. Pregnancy usually lasts about 40 weeks, and any delivery before 37 weeks is considered preterm. The costs to children and their families — financially, emotionally and in long-term health effects — can be great. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, babies born premature, especially before 32 weeks, are at higher risk of vision and hearing problems, cerebral palsy and death.

The best way to avoid these costs would be to prevent early births in the first place, said Dr. Roy Philip, a neonatologist at University Maternity Hospital Limerick in Ireland.

Philip had been vacationing abroad when his country entered lockdown March 12, and he noticed something unusual when he returned to work in late March. He asked why there had been no orders while he was gone for the breast

milk-based fortifier that doctors feed to the hospital’s tiniest preemies. The hospital’s staff said that there had been no need because none of these babies had been born all month.

Intrigued, Philip and his colleagues compared the hospital’s births so far in 2020 with births between January and April in every year since 2001 — more than 30,000 in all. They looked at birth weights, a useful proxy for very premature birth.

“Initially, I thought, ‘There is some mistake in the numbers,’” Philip said.

Over the past two decades, babies under 3.3 pounds, classified as very low birth weight, accounted for about 8 out of every 1,000 live births in the hospital, which serves a region of 473,000 people.

In 2020, the rate was about one-quarter of that. The very tiniest infants, those under 2.2 pounds and considered extremely low birth weight, usually make up 3 per 1,000 births. There should have been at least a few born that spring — but there had been none.

The study period went through the end of April. By the end of June, with the national lockdown easing, Philip said there had still been very few early preemies born in his hospital. In two decades, he said, he had never seen anything like these numbers.

While the Irish team was digging into its data, researchers in Denmark were doing the same thing, driven by curiosity over a “nearly empty” NICU. Dr. Michael Christiansen of the Statens Serum Institut in Copenhagen and his colleagues used newborn screening data to compare births nationwide during the strictest lockdown period, March 12 to April 14, with births during the same period in the previous five years. The data set included more than 31,000 infants.

The researchers found that during the lockdown, the rate of babies born before 28 weeks had dropped by a startling 90%.

Anecdotes from doctors at other hospitals around the world suggest the phenomenon may have been widespread, though not universal.

In the United States, Dr. Stephen Patrick, a neonatologist at Vanderbilt Chil-

dren’s Hospital in Nashville, Tennessee, estimated there were about 20% fewer NICU babies at his hospital than usual in March. Although some sick full-term babies would stay in the NICU, Patrick said preterm babies usually made up most of the patients, and the drop-off seemed to have been driven by missing preemies.

When Patrick shared his observation on Twitter, some U.S. doctors shared similar stories. Others said their NICUs were as busy as ever. Some groups in other countries have said they didn’t see a change, either.

If lockdowns prevented early births in certain places but not others, that information could help reveal causes of premature birth. The researchers speculated about potential factors.

One could be rest. By staying home, some pregnant women may have experienced less stress from work and commuting, gotten more sleep and received more support from their families, the researchers said.

Women staying at home also could have avoided infections in general, not just the new coronavirus. Some viruses, such as influenza, can raise the odds of premature birth.

Air pollution, which has been linked to some early births, has also dropped during lockdowns as cars stayed off the roads.

Jamieson said the observations were surprising because she would have expected to see more preterm births during the stress of the pandemic, not less.

“It seems like we have experienced tremendous stress in the U.S. due to COVID,” she said.

But all pregnant women may not have experienced the lockdowns in the same way, she said, as different countries have different social safety nets in general, and the stress of unemployment and financial insecurity may have affected communities unevenly.

Some later premature births also might have been avoided during lockdowns simply because doctors weren’t inducing mothers for reasons like high blood pressure, Jamieson said. But that wouldn’t explain a change in very early preterm births, as the Danish and Irish authors found.

24 LEGAL NOTICE

PATRICK B. RYDER

Demandados ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO CIVIL NUM. SJ2020CV02631 DE PUERTO RICO TRIBU- (803). SOBRE: SENTENCIA NAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA DECLARATORIA; INCUMPLISALA SUPERIOR DE SAN MIENTO DE CONTRATO; COJUAN. BRO DE DINERO Y DAÑOS DANERIS Y PERJUICIOS. EMPLAZAFERNÁNDEZ GERENA MIENTO POR EDICTO. ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMERIPeticionaria CA EL PRESIDENTE DE LOS EX PARTE ESTADOS UNIDOS ESTADO Causante: LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERAntonio TO RICO.

Fernández Vargas

CIVIL NUM.: SJ2019CV11891.

SALA: 802. SOBRE: ADMINISTRACION JUDICIAL DE LOS BIENES HEREDITARIOS. EMPLAZAMIENTO POR EDICTO. ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMERICA EL PRESIDENTE DE LOS ESTADOS UNIDOS EL ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO. S.S.

A: ANTONIO EDGARDO FERNANDEZ GERENA

Por la presente, se le emplaza y se le notifica que debe contestar la demanda dentro del término de treinta (30) días a partir de la publicación del presente edicto. Deberá presentar la contestación a través del Sistema Unificado de Manejo y Administración de Casos (SUMAC), al cual puede acceder utilizando la siguiente dirección electrónica: https://unired. ramaiudicial.pr/sumac, salvo que se represente por derecho propio, en cuyo caso deberá presentarla ante el Tribunal de Primera Instancia Sala Superior de San Juan con copia a la representación legal de la parte demandante a la siguiente dirección: Lcda. Ana Cristina Gómez Perez; PO Box 13762, San Juan, PR 00908; Tel. (787) 459-1035; Correo electrónico: anacgomezperez@gmail. com. Se le apercibe que, de no contestar la demanda dentro del término aquí establecido, se le anotará la rebeldía y se dictará sentencia concediendo el remedio solicitado sin más citarle ni oIrle. Expedido bajo mi firma y sello del Tribunal, en San Juan, Puerto Rico, hoy 9 de marzo de 2020. GRISELDA RODRiGUEZ COLLADO, Secretaria Regional. Raquel E. Figueroa Nater, Sec de Servicios a Sala.

LEGAL NOTICE ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA CENTRO JUDICIAL DE SAN JUAN SALA SUPERIOR.

JAMES W. TURNER CONSTRUCTION, LTD, Demandante

RYDER& RYDER, LTD; @

SOBRE: SUSTITUCIÓN DE PAGARÉ HIPOTECARIO. EMPLAZAMIENTO POR EDICTO. ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMERICA, EL PRESIDENTE DE LOS EE.UU., EL ESTADO LIBRE ASOCEADO DE P.R.

A: JOHN DOE Y RICHARD ROE, personas desconocidas que se designan con estos nombres ficticios, que puedan ser tenedor o tenedores, o puedan tener A: RYDER & RYDER, LTD. algún interés en el pagaré PATRICK B. RYDER 1133 EAST PINE STREET hipotecario a que se hace referencia más adelante PONCHATOULA, en el presente edicto, que LOUISIANA 70454; RYDER & RYDER, LTD. se publicará una sola vez.

Se les notifica que en la DePATRICK B. RYDER manda radicada en el caso AVE. LAGUNA #5 de epígrafe se alega que un COND. BELLA MARE pagaré hipotecario otorgado el CAROLINA, PUERTO 29 de abril de 2006, Ferdinand Torres Viera otorgó en San RICO;

POR LA PRESENTE se le notifica que ha sido presentada en este Tribunal por la parte demandante una demanda sobre sentencia declaratoria; incumplimiento de contrato; cobro de dinero y daños y perjuicios, cuyos hechos se detallan en la misma, la cual puede ser examinada en la secretaría de este Tribunal. REPRESENTA a los demandantes el bufete RIVERA COLON, RIVERA TORRES & RIOS BERLY (Lcdo.

Víctor M. Rivera Torres) con dirección en Avenida Fernández Juncos #1420, Santurce, Puerto Rico 00909, teléfonos (787) 727-5710, fax (787) 2681835, email: victor.riverarcrtrblaw.com. Se le advierte que este edicto se publicará en un periódico de circulación general una sola vez y que si no comparece en el término de treinta (30) días desde su publicación, los querellantes podrán solicitar que se dicte sentencia en rebeldía, declarándose con lugar la querella, sin más citarle ni oírle. EXPEDIDO, bajo mi firma y el sello del Tribunal, hoy día 13 de julio de 2020. Griselda Rodriguez Collado, Secretaria.

Marilyn Ann Espinosa Rivera, Sec Servicios a Sala.

LEGAL NOTICE ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL GENERAL DE JUSTICIA TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA DE SAN JUAN.

ORIENTAL BANK Demandante V.

FERDINAND TORRES VIERA; JOHN DOE Y RICHARD ROE

Demandados CIVIL NÚM. SJ2020CV03514.

staredictos1@outlook.com

Juan, Puerto Rico un pagaré hipotecario por la suma principal de $195,000.00, con intereses a razón del 6.50% anual, a favor de la Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria Puerto Rico (hoy Oriental Bank), o a su orden, con vencimiento el de mayo de 2011, ante el Notario Raúl Rivera Burgos, mediante el afidavit numero 10182, se extravio, sin embargo la deuda evidenciada y garantizada por dicho pagare hipotecario no ha sido salda, por lo que la parte demandante solicita que se ordene la sustitución del mismo. En garantía de dicho pagaré el 29 de abril de 2006, Ferdinand Torres Viera constituyó hlpoteca número 294 ante el Notario Raúl Rivera Burgos en garantía del pago del pagaré antes descrito, inscrita al folio 9 del tomo 657 de Rio Piedras Sur, finca 18259, inscripción 7ma, Registro de la Propiedad de San Juan, Sección IV. Modificada la hipoteca antes descrita en cuanto al principal que será $182,541.61, el interés será al 6.50% anual, vence el 1 de febrero de 2037, según consta de la escritura #15, otorgada en San Juan, Puerto Rico, el día 31 de enero de 2012, ante el Notario Público Ignacio José Gorrín Maldonado, inscrito al folio #10 del tomo #657 de Rio Piedras Sur, finca #18259, inscripción 8va y última, Registro de la Propiedad de San Juan, Sección IV. La hipoteca que garantiza dicho pagaré grava la propiedad inmueble que se describe a continuación: URBANA Apartamento #41 el cual esta localizado en el tercer piso de! Bloque C del Condominio La Sierra Del Sol, radicada en el Barrio Cupey del termino municipal de

San Juan, Puerto Rico, con una cabida superficial de 1,188 02 pies cuadrados, equivalentes a 110.36 metros cuadrados, de los cuales 1,104.02 pies cuadrados, equivalentes a 102.56 metros cuadrados, son de área cerrada y 84.0 pies cuadrados, equivalentes a 7.80 metros cuadrados, son de área de balcón. Su puerta principal es por el Este. En linderos por el NORTE, en una distancia de 24’5”, con áreas exteriores comunes; por el SUR, en una distancia de 24’5”, con áreas exteriores comunes; por el ESTE; en una distancia de 53’S”, con pared común que lo separa del apartamento #42 y con áreas exteriores comunes; y por el OESTE, en una distancia de 44’ 11”, con pared común que lo separa del apartamento #28. Contiene una cocina, laundry, salacomedor, dos dormitorios con closet, dos baños y balcón. Le corresponde el 0.4811% en los elementos comunes generales.

Le pertenece el uso y disfrute de dos áreas de estacionamientos marcados con el #21, uno frente al otro. Finca 18259 inscrita al 9 del tomo 657 de Rio Piedras Sur, Registro de la Propiedad de San Juan, Sección IV. POR LA PRESENTE se le emplaza para que presente al tribunal su alegación responsiva dentro de los 30 días de haber sido diligenciado este emplazamiento, excluyéndose el día del diligenciamiento. Usted deberá presentar su alegación responsiva a través del Sistema Unificado de Manejo y Administración de Casos (SUMAC), al cual puede acceder utilizando la siguiente dirección electrónica: https://unired.ramajudicial. pr, salvo que se represente por derecho propio, en cuyo caso deberá presentar su alegación responsiva en la secretaría del tribunal. Si usted deja de presentar su alegación responsiva dentro del referido término; el tribunal podrá dictar sentencia en rebeldía en su contra y conceder el remedio solicitado en la demanda, o cualquier otro, si el tribunal, en el ejercicio de su sana discreción, lo entiende procedente.

LCDO. JAVIER MONTALVO CINTRÓN RUANÚM. 17682 DELGADO & FERNÁNDEZ, LLC PO Box 11750 , Fernández Juncos Station San Juan, Puerto Rico 00910-1750, Tel. (787) 274-1414; Fax (787) 764-8241 E-mail: jmontalvo@ delgadofernandez.com Expedido bajo mi firma y sello del Tribunal, hoy 14 de julio de 2020. GRISELDA RODRIGUEZ COLLADO, Secretaria. Enid Diaz Rios, SubSecretaria.

(787) 743-3346

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 22, 2020 LEGAL NOTICE ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL GENERAL DE JUSTICIA TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA DE GUAYNABO.

ORIENTAL BANK Demandante V.

CITIBANK, N.A. JOHN DOE & RICHARD ROE

Demandados CIVIL NÚM. GB2020CV00377.

SOBRE: CANCELACIÓN DE PAGARÉ EXTRAVIADO. EMPLAZAMIENTO POR EDICTO. ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMÉRICA EL PRESIDENTE DE LOS EE.UU. EL ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE P.R. SS.

A: JOHN DOE Y RICHARD ROE, personas desconocidas que se designan con estos nombres ficticios, que puedan ser tenedor o tenedores, o puedan tener algún interés en el pagaré hipotecario a que se hace referencia más adelante en el presente edicto, que se publicará una sola vez.

Se les notifica que en la Demanda radicada en el caso de epígrafe se alega que el 28 de junio de 2003, a favor de Citibank, N.A., o a su orden, por la suma de $200,000.00 de principal, con intereses al 5 .% anual, con vencedero el 1 de julio de 2018, ante el Notario Mario S. Najerauriola. En garantía del pagaré antes descrito se otorgó la escritura de hipoteca número 339, en San Juan, Puerto Rico, el 28 de junio de 2003, ante el Notario Público Mario S. Najerauriola, inscrito al folio 54 del tomo 1540 de Guaynabo, finca 31062, inscripción Sta, Registro de la Propiedad de Guaynabo.

El inmueble gravado mediante la hipoteca antes descrita es la finca número 31062 inscrita al folio 54 del tomo 1540 de Guaynabo, Registro de la propiedad de Guaynabo. La obligación evidenciada por el pagaré antes descrito fue saldada en su totalidad. Dicho gravamen no ha podido ser cancelado por haberse extraviado el original del pagaré. El original del pagaré antes descrito no ha podido ser localizado, a pesar de las gestiones realizadas.

Citibank, N.A. es el acreedor que consta en el Registro de la Propiedad. El último tenedor conocido del pagaré antes descrito fue Oriental Bank. POR LA PRESENTE se le emplaza para que presente al tribunal su alegación responsiva dentro de los 30 días de haber

sido diligenciado este emplazamiento, excluyéndose el día del diligenciamiento. Usted deberá presentar su alegación responsiva a través del Sistema Unificado de Manejo y Administración de Casos (SUMAC), al cual puede acceder utilizando la siguiente dirección electrónica: https://unired.ramajudicial. pr, salvo que se represente por derecho propio, en cuyo caso deberá presentar su alegación responsiva en la secretaría del tribunal. Si usted deja de presentar su alegación responsiva dentro del referido término, el tribunal podrá dictar sentencia en rebeldía en su contra y conceder el remedio solicitado en la demanda, o cualquier otro, si el tribunal, en el ejercicio de su sana discreción, lo entiende procedente.

LCDO. JAVIER MONTALVO CINTRÓN RUA NÚM. 17682 DELGADO & FERNÁNDEZ, LLC PO Box 11750, Fernández Juncos Station San Juan, Puerto Rico 00910-1750, Tel. (787) 274-1414 Fax (787) 764-8241 E-mail: jmontalvo@ delgadofernandez.com Expedido bajo mi firma y sello del Tribunal, hoy 15 de julio de 2020. LCDA. LAURA I. SANTA SANCHEZ, Secretaria Regional. Diamar T. González Barreto, Secretaria del Tribunal.

LEGAL NOT ICE ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA DE CAROLINA.

MTGLQ INVESTORS, L.P. Parte Demandante Vs.

AUGUSTO CESAR HIRALDO COTTO, también conocido como Augusto Cesar Hiraldo Cortijo y como Augusto Cesar Hidalgo, HAYDEE RIVERA SANCHEZ y la Sociedad Legal de Bienes Gananciales compuesta entre ambos

Parte Demandada CASO CIVIL NUM: CA2020CV00094.

SOBRE: EJECUCION DE HIPOTECA POR LA VIA ORDINARIA Y COBRO DE DINERO. EMPLAZAMIENTO POR EDICTOS. ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMÉRICA EL PRESIDENTE DE LOS EE. UU. EL ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO. SS.

A: AUGUSTO CESAR HIRALDO COTTO, también conocido como Augusto Cesar Hiraldo Cortijo y como Augusto Cesar Hidalgo, HAYDEE

RIVERA SANCHEZ y la Sociedad Legal de Bienes Gananciales compuesta entre ambos:

POR LA PRESENTE se les emplaza y requiere para que conteste la demanda dentro de los treinta (30) días siguientes a la publicación de este Edicto. Usted deberá radicar su alegación responsiva a través del Sistema Unificado de Manejo y Administración de Casos (SUMAC), al cual puede acceder utilizando la siguiente dirección electrónica: http://unired.ramajudicial.pr/ sumac/, salvo que se presente por derecho propio, en cuyo caso deberá radicar el original de su contestación ante el Tribunal correspondiente y notifique con copia a los abogados de la parte demandante, Lcda.

Marjaliisa Colon Villanueva, al PO BOX 7970, Ponce, P.R. 00732; Teléfono: 787-8434168. En dicha demanda se tramita un procedimiento de cobro de dinero y ejecución de hipoteca bajo el número mencionado en el epígrafe. Se alega en dicho procedimiento que la parte Demandada incurrió en el incumplimiento del Contrato de Hipoteca, al no poder pagar las mensualidades vencidas correspondientes a los meses de enero de 2018, hasta el presente, más los cargos por demora correspondientes.

Además, adeuda a la parte demandante las costas, gastos y honorarios de abogado en que incurra el tenedor del pagaré en este litigio. De acuerdo con dicho Contrato de Garantía Hipotecaria la parte Demandante declaró vencida la totalidad de la /deuda ascendente a la suma de $47,877.75, más intereses a razón del 9.95 % anual, así como todos aquellos créditos y sumas que surjan de la faz de la obligación hipotecaria y de la hipoteca que la garantiza, incluyendo $4,792.89, pactado para costas, gastos y honorarios de abogado. La parte Demandante presentó para su inscripción en el Registro de la Propiedad correspondiente, un AVISO DE PLEITO PENDIENTE (“Lis Pendens”) sobre la propiedad objeto de esta acción cuya propiedad es la siguiente: URBANA: Solar radicado en la Urbanización El Conquistador situada en el barrio Carraizo del Municipio de Trujillo Alto, Puerto Rico, marcado con el número 26 de la manzana B, con una cabida de 342 metros cuadrados con 47 centímetros. En linderos por el NORTE, con el solar 27 distancia de 23.00 metros; por el SUR, con el solar 25 en 23.00 metros; por el ESTE,

con los solares 23 y 24 distancia de 13 metros con 694 milésimas de metro en arco y por el OESTE, con la Avenida Diego Velázquez distancia de 16.00 metros en arco. El inmueble antes descrito contiene una casa de concreto diseñada para una familia. Inscrita al folio doscientos setenta y dos (272) del tomo ciento noventa y ocho (198) de Trujillo Alto, finca numero diez mil cincuenta y cinco (10055).

Registro de la Propiedad de San Juan, Sección Cuarta.

SE LES APERCIBE que de no hacer sus alegaciones responsivas a la demanda dentro del término aquí dispuesto, se les anotará la rebeldía y se dictará Sentencia, concediéndose el remedio solicitado en la Demanda, sin más citarle ni oírle.

Expedido bajo mi firma y sello del Tribunal en Carolina Puerto Rico. A 26 de mayo de 2020.

Lcda. Marilyn Aponte Rodriguez, Secretaria Regional. Eliana Reyes Morales, Sec Auxiliar del Tribunal.

LEGAL NOTICE Estado Libre Asociado de Puerto Rico TRIBUNAL GENERAL DE JUSTICIA Tribunal de Primera Instancia Sala Superior Municipal de San Juan.

ORIENTAL BANK VS

ALBA EDA CARDONA PÉREZ; JOHN DOE Y RICHARD ROE

CIVIL NUM. SJ2020CV01399 (802). SOBRE: SUSTITUCIÓN DE PAGARÉ HIPOTECARIO. NOTIFICACIÓN DE SENTENCIA POR EDICTO POR SUMAC.

A: JOHN DOE Y RICHARD ROE

EL SECRETARIO (A) que suscribe le notifica a usted que el 17 de JULIO de 2020, este Tribunal ha dictado Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial o Resolución en este caso, que ha sido debidamente registrada y archivada en autos donde podrá usted enterarse detalladamente de los términos de esta. Esta notificación se publicará una sola vez en un periódico de circulación general en la Isla de Puerto Rico, dentro de los diez (10) días siguientes a su notificación. Y, siendo o representando usted una parte en el procedimiento sujeta a los términos de la Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial o Resolución, de la cual puede establecerse recurso de revisión o apelación dentro del término de 30 días contados a partir de la publicación por edicto de esta notificación, dirijo a usted esta notificación que se considerará hecha en la fecha

The San Juan Daily Star de la publicación de este edicto. Copia de esta notificación ha sido archivada en los autos de este caso, con fecha de 17 de julio de 2020. En San Juan, Puerto Rico, el 17 de julio de 2020. GRISELDA RODRÍGUEZ COLLADO, Secretaria Regional. f/ DENISE M. AMARO MACHUCA, Secretario (a) Auxiliar.

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

ce, Puerto Rico, el 17 de julio de 2020. LUZ MAYRA CARABALLO GARCÍA, Secretario(a) Regional. f/GISELLE GUTIÉRREZ LEÓN, Secretaria(a) Auxiliar.

DEMANDANTE: Lcdo. Reggie Díaz Hernández RUA Núm.: 16,,393 BERMUDEZ DIAZ & SÁNCHEZ LLP Edificio Ochoa Suite 200 500 Calle De La Tanca San Juan, Puerto Rico 0090 1 Tel.: (787) 523-2670 Fax: (787) 523-2664 LEGAL NOTICE rdíaz@bdslawpr.com ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO Expido este edicto bajo mi firma DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUy el sello de este Tribunal, hoy NAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA 14 de julio de 2020. GRISELDA LEGAL NOTICE SALA DE SAN JUAN. RODRIGUEZ COLLADO, SeLUIS ISAAC Estado Libre Asociado de Puercretaria Regional. ENID DIAZ to Rico TRIBUNAL GENERAL GARCIA ROBAINA RIOS, Sec Auxiliar..

Demandante v.

DE JUSTICIA Tribunal de Primera Instancia Sala Superior FIRST BANK PUERTO LEGAL NOTICE de Ponce.

RICO, JOHN DOE ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO ORIENTAL BANK Demandados DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUDEMANDANTE VS CIVIL NUM: SJ2019CV09147. NAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA THE MONEY HOUSE, SOBRE: CANCELACION DE SALA DE CAROLINA. PAGARÉ POR LA VIA JUDIINC.; SECRETARIA ORIENTAL BANK, CIAL. EMPLAZAMIENTO POR DE VIVIENDA Y Demandante, V. DESARROLLO URBANO; EDICTO. ESTADOS UNIDOS OMAR H. ROSAS AVILES, DE AMÉRICA PRESIDENTE JOHN DOE & FULANA DE TAL y la DE LOS ESTADOS UNIDOS RICHARD ROE Sociedad Legal de ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DEMANDADO Gananciales compuesta DE PUERTO RICO. SS. CIVIL NÚM.: PO2019CV04325. por ambos, A: JOHN DOE SALÓN: 604. SOBRE: CANCEDemandados COMO TENEDOR LACIÓN DE PAGARÉ EXTRACIVIL NUM.: TJ2020CV00063.

DESCONOCIDO DEL VIADO. NOTIFICACIÓN DE COBRO DE DINERO PAGARÉ por ta cantidad SOBRE: SENTENCIA POR EDICTO. POR LA VÍA ORDINARIA. EM-

contra, y conceder el remedio solicitado en la Demanda, o cualquier otro, si el tribunal, en el ejercicio de su sana discreción, lo entiende procedente.

Se le advierte que dentro de los diez (10) días siguientes a la publicación del presente edicto, se le estará enviando a usted por correo certificado con acuse de recibo, una copia del emplazamiento y de la demanda presentada al lugar de su última dirección conocida: Colinas de Fairview, 4Q34 Calle 220, Trujillo Alto, PR 00976-8228.

EXPEDIDO bajo mi firma y el sello del Tribunal en Carolina hoy día 28 de febrero de 2020.

Lic. Marilyn Aponte Rodríguez, Secretario(a). F /Damaris Torres Ruiz, Sub-Secretario(a).

LEGAL NOTICE ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA DE SAN JUAN.

COOPERATIVA DE AHORRO y CRÉDITO DR. MANUEL ZENO GANDÍA

de $100,000.00 a favor PLAZAMIENTOPO R EDICTO. JOHN DOE & Demandante vs. de First Federal Savings ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMERICHARD ROE A SER MILANGELY Bank, o a su orden (luego RICA EL PRESIDENTE DE RODRÍGUEZ CHEVRES NOTIFICADOS POR Demandada EDICTO P/C DEL LCDO. First Bank), vencedero el LOS EE.UU. EL ESTADO LI1 de abril de 2005, según BRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO CIVIL NUM.: SJ2019CV11220.

JAVIER MONTALVO RICO. SS. SALA. SOBRE: COBRO DE escritura #14 ante el CINTRÓN – PO BOX A: OMAR H. ROSAS DINERO. EMPLAZAMIENTO notario Angel Luis Robles 11750 FERNÁNDEZ POR EDICTO. ESTADOS UNIAVILES, FULANA DE TAL JUNCOS STATION, SAN Candelaria que grababa DOS DE AMERICA EL PREy la Sociedad Legal de dos fincas : 1) la finca JUAN, PR 00910-1750 SIDENTE DE LOS EE.UU. EL Gananciales compuesta 3,149 inscrita al folio 87 ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO LCDO. JAVIER por ambos DE PR. SS. del tomo 58 de Santurce MONTALVO CINTRÓN POR MEDIO del presente edicNorte, Sección Primera to se le notifica de la radicación A: SRA. MILANGEL Y – PO BOX 11750, RODRÍGUEZ CHEVRES de San Juan, la cual FERNÁNDEZ JUNCOS de una demanda en cobro de P.O. BOX 2295 respondía $75,000 .00 y; dinero por la vía ordinaria en la STATION SAN JUAN, PR 2) la finca 1,406-A inscrita que se alega que usted adeuda BAYAMÓN, PUERTO RICO 00910-1750 a la parte demandante, Oriental (Nombre de las partes a las que se 00960 al folio 115 del tomo les notifica la sentencia por edicto) Bank, ciertas sumas de dinero, o sea, la parte demandada 247 de Santurce Norte, EL SECRETARIO(A) que susy las costas, gastos y honoraarriba mencionada .

Sección Primera de San rios de abogado de este litigio. cribe le notifica a usted que 17 Juan, la cual respondía El demandante, Oriental Bank, POR LA PRESENTE se le emde julio de 2020, este Tribunal plaza y requiere para que noti$25,000.00. ha dictado Sentencia, Sentenha solicitado que se dicte sencia Parcial o Resolución en este caso, que ha sido debidamente registrada y archivada en autos donde podrá usted enterarse detalladamente de los términos de la misma. Esta notificación se publicará una sola vez en un periódico de circulación general en la Isla de Puerto Rico, dentro de los 10 días siguientes a su notificación. Y, siendo o representado usted una parte en el procedimiento sujeta a los términos de la Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial o Resolución, de la cual puede establecerse recurso de revisión o apelación dentro del término de 30 días contados a partir de la publicación por edicto de esta notificación, dirijo a usted esta notificación que se considerará hecha en la fecha de la publicación de este edicto. Copia de esta notificación ha sido archivada en los autos de este caso, con fecha de 17 de julio de 2020. En Pon-

Por la presente se le emplaza y notifica que debe contestar la demanda incoada en su contra dentro del término de treinta (30) días a partir de la publicación del presente edicto. Usted deberá presentar su alegación responsiva a través del Sistema Unificado de Manejo y Administración de Casos (SUMAC), al cual puede acceder utilizando la siguiente dirección electrónica : https://unired.ramajudicia. pr/sumac/, salvo que se represente por derecho propio . Si usted deja de presentar y notificar su alegación responsiva dentro del referido término, el Tribuna l podrá dictar sentencia en rebeldía en su contra y conceder el remedio solicitado en la Demanda, o cualquier otro , si el Tribunal, en el ejercicio de su sana discreción, lo entiende procedente. Los abogados de la parte demandante son.

ABOGADOS DE LA PARliE

tencia en contra suya y que se le ordene pagar las cantidades reclamadas en la demanda.

POR EL PRESENTE EDICTO se le emplaza para que presente al tribunal su alegación responsiva a la demanda dentro de los treinta (30) días de haber sido diligenciado este emplazamiento, excluyéndose el día del diligenciamiento. Usted deberá presentar su alegación responsiva a través del Sistema Unificado de Manejo y Administración de Casos (SUMAC), al cual puede acceder utilizando la siguiente dirección electrónica: https://unired.ramajudicial. pr/sumac/, salvo que se represente por derecho propio, en cuyo caso deberá presentar su alegación responsiva en la Secretaría del Tribunal. Si usted deja de presentar su alegación responsiva dentro del referido término, el tribunal podrá dictar sentencia en rebeldía en su

fique a la: LCDA. ANA M. CAMPOS GAVITO RUA 7710 EDIF. MANUEL ZENO GANDIA, 353 AVE. DOMENECH, SUITE 302 SAN JUAN, PUERTO RICO 00918 TEL. & FAX: (787)751-5733 EMAIL: anamcampos1@yahoo.com abogada de la parte demandante cuya dirección es la que se deja indicada , con copia de su contestación a la demanda, copia de la cual le es servida en este acto , dentro de los Treinta (30) días de haber sido diligenciado este emplazamiento, excluyéndose el día del diligenciamiento , apercibiéndole que en caso de no hacerlo así, podrá dictarse sentencia en rebeldía en contra suya , concediendo el remedio solicitado en la demanda, sin mas citarle ni oírle.

Extendido bajo mi firma y sello del Tribunal, hoy 20 de febrero de 2020. Griselda Rodriguez Collado, Secretaria. Margarita Muñoz Melendez, Sec Serv a Sala.

25

LEGAL NOTICE

LEGAL NOTICE

LEGAL NOTICE

Star

San Juan The

DAILY

El mejor lugar para publicar SUS EDICTOS! Implementamos una forma nueva e innovadora de trabajar la publicación de edictos...

“Tarifas Fijas” en todas las publicaciones.

No más cuenta de palabras, pulgadas o largas esperas!

NOTIFICACIONES SUBASTAS EMPLAZAMIENTO MARCAS EXP. DOMINIO

$60 $195 p/p $95 $60 $85 p/p

Porque estamos conscientes de la importancia de estas publicaciones, ponemos especial atención en los detalles y cumplimos con todas las regulaciones establecidas por los Tribunales en Puerto Rico.

Además...Tenemos los mejores precios!

Garantizado!

(787) 743-3346 • staredictos@thesanjuandailystar.com •

26

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

Baseball in middle America: Fans are in, autographs are out

By TIM ARANGO

F

orget about everything else for a moment and take a look at this: The retired No. 8, worn in this city by Roger Maris, Fargo’s revered son, on the facade over first base. The red-white-and-blue bunting draped over the railings. The ballplayers warming up down the foul lines.

The people are finding their seats, and somewhere the big red mascot is getting ready. Any minute now the umpires will arrive, fully dressed and carrying their baseballs and walking straight from the parking lot to the field.

It came late, but here it is: opening day.

The last time the Fargo-Moorhead RedHawks played a game was in September.

“We didn’t know what was going to happen in the months to come,” Jack Michaels, the team’s radio man for a quarter-century, barks to his audience. “But all I know is this: 297 days later, fans are in the stands, teams are in the dugouts and baseball is back.”

Major League Baseball will start its pandemicshortened season this week, but there will be no fans in the stands. The minor league season was canceled, depriving dozens of small towns of baseball this summer. Two prominent independent leagues, the Atlantic League and the Frontier League, are also not playing.

That leaves us with four cities in Middle America — Fargo; Sioux Falls, S.D.; Franklin, Wisc.; and Rosemont, Ill. — where professional baseball is being played in front of fans, cautiously, joyfully, but hardly normally.

After months of uncertainty, the American Association, an independent league where players make about $2,000 a month and whose rosters are filled with former minor leaguers and sprinkled with former big leaguers, began its season over the Fourth of July weekend.

Six teams in four cities. Blocked from hosting games in Canada, the Winnipeg Goldeyes are playing their home games in Fargo, where the dimensions of Newman Outdoor Field are those of Yankee Stadium, an homage to Maris. The St. Paul Saints will play theirs in Sioux Falls, where for a recent series they dressed in a hockey arena that was hosting a Professional Bull Riders competition and walked across a parking lot, cleats crunching on the pavement, to get to the field.

“Right now there are a lot of things to think about,” said Chris Coste, the interim manager of the RedHawks, who has played at every level of professional baseball, from right here in Fargo to the Mexican League to the Philadelphia Phillies. “Fans. Public health. Players’ health. Winning games. It’s almost always just about the baseball on opening day.

“But today it’s about a little more than just baseball.”

A Fresh Start Just baseball is enough for Nancy and Terry Peterson. They have missed only one opening day in Fargo since 1996, and said getting back to the ballpark, and reclaiming a measure of normalcy and ritual, was worth the risk. But signs of the pandemic are all around: A local distillery, a maker of whiskey and gin, provides hand sanitizer stations; all employees, as well as the umpires, wear masks; every other row of seats is roped off to enforce social distancing.

The Petersons are in line early because the team is selling only a limited number of general admission tickets — about half the stadium’s capacity of 4,500, in accord with virus protocols — and they want to get their usual seats.

Once inside, Terry Peterson is overjoyed: “Baseball is back. Cold beer. The sun is shining.”

In the bottom of the third, Blake Grant-Parks, a former prospect in the Tampa Bay Rays system, crushes the first home run of the year, over the left-field wall.

On the field, the RedHawks — heeding warnings to avoid touching one another — are all smiles and awkward, phantom high-fives.

They are also not supposed to spit sunflower seeds or dip tobacco, but if you look closely, you will see that these baseball vices are difficult to break. Signing autographs and tossing foul balls into the stands are also forbidden.

In the bottom of the ninth, Dario Pizzano comes to the plate. A former Ivy League player of the year

at Columbia who played at Class AAA for the Seattle Mariners, Pizzano, 29, spent the early months of the pandemic with his fiancée in their Hoboken, N.J. apartment, hoping for a season. In Fargo, he keeps a rally going with a line-drive single to right.

Social distancing is forgotten in the excitement of the moment, now filled with bumping fists and slapping backs. The RedHawks’ rally falls short, but by the time the postgame fireworks begin, and with Bruce Springsteen blaring from the loudspeakers, it felt as if the American summer had been restored.

‘There’s No Script for This’ Each day when the players arrive at the ballpark in Fargo, they meet an intern at the entrance who takes their temperature and reads from a printed sheet. “To the best of your knowledge,” the question begins, “have you had direct close contact with anyone who has tested positive for COVID-19 in the last 24 hours?”

Every day in the league unfolds against an undercurrent of anxiety.

Already there has been a scare: Two players on the Milwaukee Milkmen tested positive for the coronavirus and a game was canceled. The players were taken from their apartments, or the homes of their host families, including the center fielder who is living with the team’s owner, and quarantined in a hotel until everyone was retested and cleared to play.

“There’s no script for this,” said Duell Higbe, the general manager of the Sioux Falls Canaries. “Nobody’s done this before. We’re rolling with the punches every single day.”

Unlike the major leagues, which can count on revenue from television, playing without fans was never an option for the American Association.

“Zero chance,” said Brad Thom, the president of the RedHawks. “Fans are our lifeblood.”

Even so, each team, no matter how successful the season, is likely to lose hundreds of thousands of dollars. “It’s honestly a disaster,” Thom said. “We’re looking at high-six-figure losses.”

The stadium in Sioux Falls, known as the Birdcage, was built in the late 1960s and has all the asymmetric charms of an old ballpark: odd angles and nooks in the outfield, a grassy berm that juts out past third base above an old-timey scoreboard.

As fans walked in for a recent afternoon game — only a few hundred showed up amid the scorching heat, but they saw their Canaries beat the Saints, 3-0 — the public-address announcer told fans they assumed the risks of contracting the virus at the ballpark. He urged them to obey social distancing “so we can have baseball here at the Birdcage all summer long.”

Continues on page 27

The San Juan Daily Star From page 26 It took only a few games for the first manager to be ejected for violating social distancing guidelines. That distinction fell on Anthony Barone of the Milkmen, who stepped over the third-base line and argued a bang-bang call at first base.

“You sort of get lost in the game,” he said.

Still Chasing the Dream K.C. Huth, the center fielder for the Canaries, was working out and selling awnings and shade structures in Dallas when the pandemic hit. His gym closed, and the fields where he took batting practice locked their gates.

“Man, I was hopping fences, I was doing everything I could to get on a patch of grass to get ready,” he said.

A handful of major league players, with guaranteed contracts and money in the bank, have decided not to play this season because of health concerns.

In the American Association, sitting out was not a realistic option.

“Players play indie ball because they want to get back to affiliated ball,” Rick Forney, the Winnipeg manager, said.

“They are still chasing the dream of getting to the big leagues.”

“These guys, their window is short,”

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

he added.

Leobaldo Pina, a Venezuela native and Fargo’s third baseman, spent the offseason feeding cows and cutting grass on a farm in Pennsylvania. Matt Tomshaw, a RedHawks left-hander, was in major league camp with the Chicago White Sox in March, and also working as a mortgage analyst. Andrew Ely, who rose to Class AA in the Chicago Cubs organization and was Gleyber Torres’ double play partner in rookie ball, is now the shortstop for the Canaries.

He also works for a private equity firm based in Los Angeles, researching distressed assets.

There are also other, more pedigreed, players.

Cito Culver, a shortstop for the RedHawks, was the New York Yankees’ firstround pick in 2010, which briefly made him a possible heir apparent to Derek Jeter. Pitcher Bradin Hagens spent four days with the Arizona Diamondbacks in 2014. Drew Ward was a third-round draft pick and in big-league camp this spring with the Washington Nationals, expecting to start off in the minors but believing “I would have had a chance going up this year.” Now he is living in the Fargo Inn & Suites and hoping to get back.

27

The Fargo-Moorhead RedHawks play in the American Association, where six teams are trying to play the season.

Almost all of the players have spent years in the minor leagues or independent ball. This season, though, is life at the lowest rungs of baseball as it has never been. There are fewer bus rides, and hardly any nightlife to speak of.

Manager Mike Meyer of the Canaries said he had trouble sleeping on Saturday nights, knowing he would receive the team’s weekly coronavirus test results the next day.

“This is the most anxious and stressed I’ve been ever in my 20-something seasons in baseball,” he said.

For many fans, though, the return of baseball has meant less anxiety in their lives.

Among them is Jerry Bowman,

who since 1994 has owned Seat 17, Section R, Row 10 at the Birdcage.

Bowman, 70, is one of the few fans who wears a mask to games, where he is in charge of sliding ‘K’ signs down a zip line behind home plate every time a Canaries pitcher strikes out a batter.

“I was surprised and elated” to hear baseball would return, said Bowman, who spent the first weeks of the pandemic watching old Westerns. “It gave me something to do. Being outside, watching baseball. There’s nothing better.”

Just then a visiting batter struck out.

“Excuse me, I have to drop a K,” he said. “I’ll be right back.”

Men’s tennis tournament in Washington is canceled

By CHRISTOPHER CLAREY

T

he Citi Open in Washington, which was scheduled to relaunch the men’s tennis tour next month, has been canceled for 2020.

The tournament was set to begin Aug. 14 and serve as a lead-in event for the U.S. Open. But Mark Ein, the Citi Open chairman, said concern about international travel restrictions and recent trends in the coronavirus had led to the cancellation.

The decision, made Monday, will increase doubts about this year’s U.S. Open, which is scheduled to be played without spectators in New York from Aug. 31 to Sept. 13.

But Stacey Allaster, the U.S. Open tournament director, reaffirmed Monday that plans remained on track for a doubleheader at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center. The Western & Southern Open is to be played

Nick Kyrgios won in Washington in 2019. This year’s event has been canceled. there from Aug. 22 to 28 as a prelude to the U.S. Open, with players and officials operating inside a health and safety “bubble” similar to those being used by the NBA and other leagues.

“We are all in,” Allaster said.

The Citi Open cancellation, which came in the week that the WNBA and Major League Baseball are planning to resume play, underscored the unusual challenges that professional tennis faces as an international sport that shifts venues and continents on a regular basis.

Because of the rise in coronavirus cases in the United States, the European Union is not allowing American travelers to enter. And although the United States is allowing foreign athletes to enter, there are lingering uncertainties about whether athletes would be required to quarantine upon arrival.

Although exhibitions are being staged regularly on a regional basis and World Team Tennis is being played at the Greenbrier Resort in West Virginia, the regular men’s and women’s tours have been shut down since March.

The WTA Tour plans to be the first

to resume with a clay-court event in Palermo, Italy, from Aug. 3 to Aug. 9.

That will be followed by a clay-court event in Prague and a new hardcourt event, the Top Seed Open, in Lexington, Ky., from Aug. 10 to Aug. 16 that already has commitments from Serena and Venus Williams.

But the ATP Tour has no plans to fill the gap left by the Citi Open’s cancellation. For now, its season will resume in New York with the Western & Southern Open, followed by the U.S. Open.

But those events, if they do take place, are uncertain to attract fullstrength fields with some men’s players likely to remain in Europe and restart their seasons on clay. Novak Djokovic, the world’s top-ranked player, and Rafael Nadal, the reigning U.S. Open men’s singles champion, are among those considering that option.

28

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

Jailed soccer official contracts Coronavirus in Florida prison

By TARIQ PANJA

J

uan Ángel Napout, a former vice president of soccer’s governing body FIFA serving a nine-year sentence for corruption, has tested positive for the coronavirus inside a Miami federal prison. The positive result came days after a federal judge denied his appeal for compassionate release.

Lawyers for Napout, 62, a Paraguayan who was the head of South American soccer at the time of his arrest in 2015, have since April cited the risk of coronavirus in an effort to get him released from the Federal Correctional Institution in Miami. Last week, Judge Pamela K. Chen of U.S. District Court, who oversaw Napout’s 2017 trial in Brooklyn, N.Y., decided to put off a final decision, saying she wanted more time to evaluate the measures being taken to contain the spread of the virus at the jail.

Despite the prison’s efforts, including severe lockdown measures, several inmates and prison employees have contracted the virus, and the number of cases continues to grow.

According to the latest figures published by the Federal Bureau of Prisons, 93 inmates and 10 correctional officers have contracted the virus at the Miami facility, which holds about 1,000 inmates.

Based on Napout’s positive test result, his lawyer, Marc A. Weinstein, said in a telephone interview, “We are asking once again for the court to grant Mr. Napout a compassionate release due to the deadly and rampant pandemic that has hit his prison facility.

“When we asked for this relief in April it seemed inevitable that we would get to this point. Now the inevitable has happened: Mr. Napout has tested positive and his life is in

Juan Ángel Napout, a former FIFA vice president, was convicted after a 2017 trial in Brooklyn. danger. The court did not intend to impose a death sentence at the time the sentence was imposed and should take the appropriate steps now to insure that is not the sentence that he suffers.”

An official at the Miami prison said regulations prohibited it from commenting on Napout’s health.

The U.S. Justice Department’s case against Napout and other senior FIFA officials — begun with a series of dawn raids at a Zurich hotel in May and December 2015 — shook the soccer governing body and led to the arrest or

ouster of a number of top officials, including several, like Napout, who had served on its decision-making executive committee. Many of the soccer officials and business executives who were named in the U.S. indictments later pleaded guilty. Napout did not.

In December 2017, he was convicted and received a nine-year sentence after a jury found him guilty of one count of racketeering conspiracy and two counts of wire fraud conspiracy. He is scheduled to be released in August 2025.

The spread of the virus in Miami’s pris-

ons has alarmed both inmates and guards, with union officials in recent days warning of a looming crisis and raising alarms about the health risks to those inside the facility.

Chen, the judge, noted the rise in the number of cases at the prison at last week’s hearing but said they did not pass the threshold to consider Napout for release.

“That is certainly a significant factor, and I understand why the defendant thinks it substantially strengthens his argument for compassionate release, but I still do not feel that compassionate release is warranted at this time,” Chen said at the hearing last Wednesday. Compassionate release, she pointed out, “has historically been intended to redress situations where an inmate is actually suffering from frequently a fatal disease or imminent death.” Chen scheduled the next hearing for July 29.

“I don’t accept the premise that this is not a situation that can’t be controlled,” she said.

“I don’t accept the premise that Mr. Napout, at least at this point in time, is at imminent risk of contracting COVID.” The Miami prison began full lockdown measures July 7, reducing contact between prisoners and limiting their time outside their cells.

Napout said by email, and prison statistics confirmed, that about 10 percent of the facility was now infected with the virus, with several new cases confirmed since his hearing last week. M. Kristin Mace, an assistant U.S. attorney, said Napout should not be released because he was not in “the most high-risk group.”

“The DOJ said everything was good and that I wasn’t at risk and yet I got the virus,” Napout wrote.

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

29

Sudoku How to Play: Fill in the empty fields with the numbers from 1 through 9.

Sudoku Rules: Every row must contain the numbers from 1 through 9 Every column must contain the numbers from 1 through 9 Every 3x3 square must contain the numbers from 1 through 9

Crossword

Answers on page 30

Wordsearch

GAMES

HOROSCOPE Aries

30

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

(Mar 21-April 20)

Spending quality time with your family and friends will make you realise how preoccupied you have been with work and other responsibilities. You forgot how good it can be to relax with people whose company you have always enjoyed and you will want to make time in your life to do this more often.

Libra

(Sep 24-Oct 23)

It will be hard work to establish a secure foundation but it will be worth it. Instead of setting your sights too high, take baby steps towards your goals. If a relocation will help solve your problem, be willing to take the plunge. What’s important is that you step away from an unhealthy relationship, situation or surroundings.

Taurus

(April 21-May 21)

Scorpio

Money you were expecting from an inheritance or insurance settlement will be delayed. A legal matter will be decided against you. Instead of getting angry, accept the decision and turn this into an opportunity to make a fresh start. Take a course in a subject you want to learn more about.

Resist the urge to talk about depressing news.

Take time to count your blessings. Friendships are worth their weight in gold. When feeling discouraged let your loved ones remind you of the wonderful person you happen to be.

Channel your energy into a creative project.

A positive attitude will help get you out of this rut.

Gemini

(May 22-June 21)

Sagittarius

(Nov 23-Dec 21)

Cancer

(June 22-July 23)

Capricorn

(Dec 22-Jan 20)

Be patient and persistent regarding a financial or legal matter. Dig in your heels if you know you are entitled to a refund. Someone will claim they aren’t obligated to pay you due to a technical loophole. Dig in your heels. The threat of a lawsuit may be enough to get things working in your favour.

Encouraging people to be honest with you will avoid arguments and misunderstandings. Someone who made an error will be doing all they can to make amends. Remember we all make mistakes. Offer praise where it is due. Your compassionate attitude will help build deeper bonds with a best friend or romantic partner.

Together you will make an unbeatable team.

Leo

(July 24-Aug 23)

(Oct 24-Nov 22)

Getting involved in a charity is your way to give back to your community. Help those who are struggling to make ends meet. Donate to a food bank or a second-hand shop. Run errands for neighbours who can’t get out of the house.

When you help others, your own good fortune will multiply. If you’re searching for a job, a career opportunity will follow soon.

Overcoming recent setbacks will help steer you in the right direction. There is power in this present moment. You have every right to be happy, healthy and wealthy, contrary to what you have experienced before or to what you have been told. Nobody should dictate your choices. Remember: you can establish the lifestyle you have always longed for.

Aquarius

(Jan 21-Feb 19)

Allowing issues to prey on your mind won’t solve the problem. If something is bothering you, do something about it. Take your concerns to a higher authority if you aren’t able to fix it yourself. Take action to correct a difficult situation. At least then you will know you have tried.

Coming to terms with upsetting feelings can be difficult. Don’t let sad and angry emotions take over and make you feel isolated. You need to find ways to provide a healthy outlet for these sentiments. Share your thoughts with friends you can trust or talk to a counsellor.

Getting involved with a charitable organisation will lift your spirits.

Virgo

Pisces

(Aug 24-Sep 23)

Don’t be intimidated by a rival’s confidence and charisma. Proving you are just as capable as they are will be a welcome challenge.

A little rivalry will be a blessing in disguise as this makes you realise you’ve become too attached to familiar routines. The inspiration to start a new project, relationship or activity will flow. Follow an assertive person’s example.

(Feb 20-Mar 20)

Laughter and having fun with friends will remind you there’s more to life than work and worries. Surround yourself with positive, upbeat people. Spending time with the right people will help you forget your cares and woes, even if just temporarily. Gossip will be informative. Try to take most things in your stride.

Answers to the Sudoku and Crossword on page 29

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

31

CARTOONS

Herman

Speed Bump

Frank & Ernest

BC

Scary Gary

Wizard of Id

For Better or for Worse

The San Juan Daily Star

Ziggy

32

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

Disfruta el Verano Nintendo Switch lite

PS4

Super Sonic 32”

LG 65 ó Samsung .00

$189

.00

$789

TV Mount desde

$29.00

$399.00

$299

.00

Máquina Lavado a presión .00

QFX Remote Controlled Motorized 360 Rotating Outdoor Antenna

$29

$149.00

Estufa de Gas 30” Mabe

$449

.00

Samsung A10s

I Pad Generación 7 .00

$449

$389.00

TOPE de Gas

$489.00 LG CM4360

$169

.00

Super Bass 2MH 3000

$89.00

Radio Bluetooth

Nevera BIZT

$289.00

$29.00

Abanico recargable

Incluye kit de bocina, pendrive y tweeter

$69.00

$129.00

Licuadora OSTER

$49.00

Smart-tv-kit

$99.00

Lasko 18” Elegance Performance

$69.00 ¡Disfruta el mejor Perfortmance!

Abanico Industrial

Model RL-20IFF

$39.00

DEALER AUTORIZADO EN PIEZAS Y SERVICIO