Wednesday Jul 29, 2020 by The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 29, 2020

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‘Ready’ for the Unknown

With a Huge Scar Left by Hurricane Maria, NMEAD Insists Gov’t Is All Set for a Storm

Is PREPA Ready? The Differences Blackout Just a Day Between the House and Before Tropical Senate Stimulus Bills P4 Storm Lands P7 NOTICIAS EN ESPAÑOL P 19

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 29, 2020

- “Nosotros los empleados de la AEE estamos locos de empezar con ustedes y estar a la altura de la industria eléctrica a nivel mundial para echar a P.R. hacia adelante y acabar con el abuso que tienen aquí la unión esta”. - “We Are Ready”. - “Esperando con mucho deseo que se entrevisten con los empleados”. - “Bienvenidos a Puerto Rico”. - “Welcome to Puerto Rico. Team AEE member!!! Hoping to be Team LUMA”. - “Trabajé como Line Man por 18 años con la AEE. Mis últimos 5 años fui Line Man 4. Me interesa saber cómo puedo aplicar con LUMA PR”.

-Agradezco la iniciativa de mantener abiertos los canales de comunicación y la disponibilidad para aclarar todas nuestras dudas. Aunque los procesos de cambios inevitablemente causan incertidumbre y ansiedad, estar informados nos ayuda a procesar estos cambios de manera responsable y proactiva. Estoy seguro de que este nuevo comienzo en manos de la administración de LUMA, resultarán en grandes oportunidades profesionales para los empleados de la Autoridad, y más que nada, en numerosos beneficios para el pueblo de Puerto Rico. Ofrezco mi disponibilidad para brindar la asistencia durante cualquier etapa del proceso de transición.

De una empresa privada, estoy ubicado en la AEE de Santurce. Estoy interesado en ser parte de ustedes si van a reclutar personal. Soy bilingüe y tengo solo mi 4to año. Estoy a su disposición. Tengo 6 años trabajando en la AEE.

-Estoy disponible para ser parte de LUMA, aquí a disposición. Soy ingeniero eléctrico experimentado con más de 20 años de experiencia trabajando como gestor de construcción eléctrica y consultor eléctrico en AEE, FLOUR y Farmacéuticas; entre otros. Estoy interesado en obtener información sobre el proceso de contratación y las oportunidades en LUMA Puerto Rico.

-Vivo en Puerto Rico y recientemente se anunció que LUMA Energy administrará el sistema de energía eléctrica de la Isla. Escribo este correo porque me gustaría ser considerado para un puesto en LUMA

Espero recibir noticias pronto. Actualmente, estoy buscando un nuevo desafío. Me gustaría ser considerado como parte del cambio que todos los puertorriqueños merecen.

-Buenos días. Como cliente y ciudadano de San Juan les doy bienvenida.

-Buenas tardes. Recibimos ayer un email sobre preguntas y respuestas relacionadas al proceso de transición de la AEE a LUMA Energy. En mi carácter personal, agradezco la disposición para aclarar las dudas.

Si ustedes logran que esto ocurra con LUMA, tendrán empleados con un gran compromiso, fidelidad y orgullo de servir y de ofrecer un sistema de energía eléctrica de calidad a nuestro país… y lo podemos lograr junto con LUMA.

- Los empleados de la Autoridad llevamos desde el 2014 con incertidumbre sobre nuestro empleo y retiro, con rechazo del pueblo de Puerto Rico solamente por trabajar aquí (algunas brigadas han experimentado hasta insultos cuando están trabajando en la calle), una alta gerencia que no tiene comunicación con nosotros (de muchos asuntos nos hemos enterado por la prensa),

-Soy técnico de AEE. Buscando información encontré que las compañías QUANTA Y ATCO tienen una excelente política con relación a sus empleados veteranos y militares. Como veterano, que me enorgullece serlo,… ¿qué planes tiene LUMA para con los veteranos?

Esto es solo una muestra del apoyo y deseo de pertenecer a

- “Hi, welcome to PR. We are waiting for this moment. Now you have full support of PREPA Safety Team. - “Tengo experiencia trabajando en compañías de electricidad y me gustaría aprender aún más”. - “Quisiera saber cómo nos podemos comunicar directamente con ustedes para saber qué nos ofrecen a los empleados”. - “I am PREPA worker. I am willing to work for you”. -¿En qué fecha entrevistarán a los empleados interesados en unirse a LUMA? Estoy muy interesado en ser parte de esto. -Gracias anticipadas por la disposición para aclarar dudas. ¡Deseándoles éxito en esta nueva tarea! -Primero, quiero darles la bienvenida a este gran reto, que es llevar el sistema de energía eléctrica de Puerto Rico a un nivel moderno, confiable y eficiente. Quiero agradecerles la comunicación directa. Les recomiendo que esta comunicación sea con la mayor frecuencia posible.

lumapr.com

-Recibí la información sobre la

si cumplo con los requisitos de

transición de la AEE a LUMA. Actualmente, estoy a punto de completar mis 30 años de servicio con

cualquier empleo en el área de

la Autoridad. Tengo tanto compromiso con mi empresa que me gustaría seguir trabajando para LUMA en el

ingeniería. Les agradezco su atención. De tener alguna pregunta, no duden en ponerse en contacto conmigo en cualquier momento.

futuro. -Buen día, soy empleado de la -Muchas gracias a ustedes por hacer la diferencia. Me gustaría pertenecer a ustedes y espero que salgan nuevas oportunidades. ¿Dónde puedo enviar mi resumé? Estoy muy deseoso de que me llamen ya.

Autoridad de Energía Eléctrica de Puerto Rico. Actualmente, soy Supervisor de Líneas de Ingreso. Estoy en la disposición de abrirme nuevas puertas en LUMA.

Si están buscando un empleado que piense “out of the box”… ¡Estoy listo! -¡Saludos! Deseo información sobre las plazas disponibles. Adjunto resumé para el Departamento de Recursos Humanos. -¡Saludos! Quisiera información de los empleos disponibles. Gracias. -Como todos, en este proceso de transición, tenemos una serie de preguntas en relación a la información provista. Las preguntas son las siguientes: Estoy interesado en pertenecer a LUMA.

hemos experimentado 3 desastres casi consecutivos (como el huracán María, terremotos y la pandemia) y ni unas gracias nos han dado. Es importante que estos temas delicados sean tratados con la sensibilidad que amerita para cuidar la salud mental de nosotros los empleados que hemos tenido todas esas experiencias antes mencionadas y que ahora enfrentamos el miedo natural al cambio, a lo desconocido. La comunicación directa y la apertura a recibir mensajes de parte de ustedes es un gran paso en esta dirección. Los empleados de la AEE son fieles y orgullos de la Autoridad.

-Recibí la información sobre la transición de la AEE a LUMA. Actualmente, estoy por cumplir mis 30 años de servicio con la Autoridad. Tengo un compromiso con mi empresa y me gustaría seguir con el mismo compromiso de seguir trabajando para LUMA. Mi pregunta es… si me acojo al retiro de la AEE, durante los próximos meses, ¿podré solicitar trabajo cuando salgan las plazas publicadas en LUMA? - ¡Buenas tardes! Yo trabajaba con la AEE y renuncié. Me fui para Estados Unidos y ahora quiero regresar a mi Isla para trabajar con ustedes. -"Muchos éxitos para Puerto Rico gracias por estar aquí para mejorar nuestro sistema eléctrico; yo trabajo por 26 años AEE en Transmisión y necesitamos mejorar mucho y con la ayuda de ustedes será posible." -"Saludos, estoy recién graduando de la UPR en Mayagüez como ingeniero eléctrico. Me gustaría ver si tendría alguna oportunidad de trabajar para su compañía o si tuviese alguna posición como ingeniero eléctrico o ingeniero de proyectos. Le agradecería si me podrían ayudar en eso, cualquier otra información que necesiten se la puedo hacer llegar vía correo electrónico. Muchas gracias por su tiempo y éxito en su compañía." -"Para solicitar empleo en PR ya que trabajo en la Florida con ### Energy". -"Tengo licencia de ayudante de perito con experiencia urbano, comercial e industrial, dónde puedo ver ofertas de empleo."

lumapuertorico

GOOD MORNING

July 29, 2020

The San Juan Daily Star, the only paper with News Service in English in Puerto Rico, publishes 7 days a week, with a Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday edition, along with a Weekend Edition to cover Friday, Saturday and Sunday.

Gov’t still prepares as possible tropical storm nears Puerto Rico

Today’s

Weather

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

Day

Night

High

Low

87ºF

78ºF

Precip 10%

Precip 20%

Partly Cloudy

Wind: Humidity: UV Index: Sunrise: Sunset:

From ENE 16 mph 70% 10 of 10 6:00 AM Local Time 7:00 PM Local Time

INDEX Local 3 Mainland 7 Business 11 International 14 Viewpoint 18 Noticias en Español 19 Entertainment 20 22 Fashion

Health Legals Sports Games Horoscope Cartoons

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s the government kept saying they are ready for a weather-related disaster risk, they were still preparing on Tuesday evening as the National Weather Service (NWS) issued a tropical storm warning for Puerto Rico and the U.S Virgin Islands due to Potential Tropical Cyclone 9, which was on course to arrive late this afternoon. Earlier in the day, as La Fortaleza called the press to the Emergency Management and Disaster Administration Bureau (NMEAD by its Spanish acronym) Operations Center to follow up for the preparations during hurricane season on Tuesday at 11:30 a.m., only NMEAD Acting Commissioner Nino Correa Filomeno and Public Safety Department (DSP by its Spanish initials) Secretary Pedro Janer showed up and said the bureau is still preparing for the climatic event. Vázquez was unavailable as she had other business to attend to. “We were at a meeting and she had other commitments pending,” Correa said. “On my part, I asked her, at one point, to request every agency chief to come here and participate in these meetings in order to address the coming emergency. We were supposed to have a drill here with personnel from the Federal Emergency and Management Agency in order to take this matter with a bit more seriousness.” Correa said with the NWS still monitoring Potential Tropical Cyclone 9 (PTC 9), as there was no certainty with its behavior, he asked Vázquez to hand out all essential information to prepare their work plan. Meanwhile, NMEAD waits for NWS to respond as they ordered a hurricane-hunting aircraft to analyze the 400-mile wide atmospheric phenomenon and provide a certain forecast. “What the NWS has said in advance is that we will be getting rain; however, once the hurricane hunting aircraft returns and lands, we will later be able to acknowledge what this phenomenon is about and how we will work with it,” Correa said. Janer added that the DSP is still on the alert as the weather service reports updates from PTC 9. Likewise, he called for islanders to be calm as the storm does not compare to Hurricane Maria. “We want to refine information according to the amount of knowledge we have at the moment; once we get results from the hurricane-hunting aircraft, we will get

a deeper picture as to what scenario to expect and what we are truly waiting for,” Janer said. “As of now, we will get a lot of rain, a lot of water in the next three days. We are not in the same situation as with Hurricane Maria, but we have to respect it.” When a member of the press asked, due to the limited information available at the time, what else NMEAD is working on given the amount of rain that the island expects from the atmospheric event, Correa emphasized that as the Atlantic hurricane season is going to be more active, he called for family members to work on their emergency plans and added that once they get an accurate prognosis from NWS, NMEAD will identify which areas will be vulnerable to floods and will communicate with the mayors of the affected municipalities, especially the southern municipalities. Nonetheless, as the bureau is still identifying more spaces to use as shelters, he said that there were 324 refugee centers available. “Today, we have to temper everything to COVID-19,” Correa said. “We held meetings that are important because we want everyone to be clear that there are some schools in the south that, depending on the amount of rain we get, they will not be used for shelters. We are identifying community centers, [abandoned] warehouses, hotels, motels; we’re still working on spaces that are suitable for refugees.” At press time, the governor had yet to speak to the press due to a meeting with agency chiefs at the NMEAD Operations Center that addressed preparations related to the tropical storm warning. According to a NWS briefing, tropical storm conditions were expected to reach the island this afternoon and continue through Thursday morning.

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 29, 2020

PREPA was ready for tropical storm, but power went out the day before By THE STAR STAFF

s a storm system appears to be approaching Puerto Rico, some 500,000 Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority (PREPA) customers lost power on Tuesday due to an outage at Ecoeléctrica, one of PREPA’s suppliers. The power outage occurred after PREPA announced through its Twitter account that it was ready to handle a storm. The utility said it has $135 million in materials and equipment, equipped staff and agreements with other electric power companies in the mainland U.S. to help with repairs if needed. Ángel Figueroa Jaramillo, head of the Electrical Industry and Irrigation Workers Union, said via Twitter that the situation was complicated because a 230 kilovolt line that connects Ecoeléctrica to Costa Sur went offline. He said Ecoeléctrica was ready to resume operations. The outage occurred as a system in the Atlantic was moving closer to Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands and was gaining strength as a storm. A tropical storm warning was in effect on Tuesday, with the storm system expected to arrive this afternoon and affect the region through early Friday, according to the National Weather Service. Tropical storm force

winds (35-45 miles per hour with gusts of up to 60 mph) were possible starting this afternoon and lasting until early Thursday morning, with projected rainfall of 3 to 6 inches (and up to 10 inches in isolated areas) in the U.S.V.I. and Puerto Rico. Meanwhile, Natural and Environmental Resources Secretary Rafael Machargo Maldonado issued Administrative Order 2020-07K to clarify instructions on activities at marinas to ease the movement of boats to safer areas. “In other words, any boat owner who wishes to relocate a boat, secure anchorage or remove it from a marina, will be able to do so, taking all precautionary measures, in a safe, orderly and coordinated manner with the managers of the marinas,” he said in a written statement. Vessels may move between marinas with the purpose of protecting them or to engage in repairs to face an atmospheric emergency. The hours of the marinas continue to be seven days a week, from 5 a.m. to 9 p.m.; however, activities in common areas are prohibited. Any person who enters the marinas will be responsible for complying with the COVID-19 Prevention Protocol (including maintenance and disinfection tasks). “We urge all sailors to secure their boats in advance, taking into account all safety measures,” Machargo Maldonado added.

UTIER official calls energy subsidy announcement a ‘political move’ By PEDRO CORREA HENRY Twitter: @PCorreaHenry Special to The Star

fter Gov. Wanda Vázquez Garced earlier this week announced a $20 million grant award that would help low-income families pay their Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority (PREPA) bills, Electrical Industry and Irrigation Workers Union (UTIER by its Spanish acronym) Vice President Freddyson Martínez called the announcement a “political move” on Tuesday since the subsidy is not something that was achieved by the Vázquez administration. Martínez said the economic aid that is available to participants in the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families and Nutritional Assistance programs is nothing new,

something he said he knows from having worked at the island Housing Department since 1995. The only difference, he said, is that the subsidy for those who are eligible will be higher due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Meanwhile, he said, the agency must ensure that the grant award has been properly assigned. “We must verify that the funds are actually assigned because this should not be used as a political campaign [gimmick] for the governor, where she has assigned a million dollars here and a few million there,” Martínez said. “It’s ironic [for her] to announce this now [Monday] even though this grant has existed for years. The increase [in payments] due to the COVID-19 pandemic might be newsworthy, but there’s nothing new about the rest.”

The union official also said he finds it more ironic that Vázquez released the information when PREPA’s transmission and distribution network is being transferred to Luma Energy in order to revamp the system over a 15-year period, which could render families in Puerto Rico ineligible for grant

awards like the aforementioned. “If the Luma Energy contract is not revoked, PREPA will become a private corporation, the power bill will increase, and every grant award and aid available to help Puerto Ricans pay their power bills will not exist,” he said.

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 29, 2020

Puerto Rico residents face cuts in food assistance program By JOHN McPHAUL jpmcphaul@gmail.com

early 1.5 million Puerto Rico residents, including more than 300,000 children, are facing deep cuts in food assistance in August when the island will run out of federal emergency nutrition assistance, the Center for Budget Policy and Priorities (CBPP) said Tuesday. “Despite this need, the new Senate Republican economic relief plan doesn’t include more food aid for Puerto Rico,” the non-profit group said. “While the House-passed Heroes Act includes a modest increase in nutrition funding for Puerto Rico, it too falls short of governor Wanda Vázquez Garced’s request.” CBPP released a new analysis on Tuesday urging policymakers to boost nutrition funding for Puerto Rico in the next relief package. “Food insecurity in Puerto Rico was already high before the pandemic and has only worsened due to COVID-19-related increases in unemployment and mandated school closures,” CBPP said. “Making matters worse, Puerto Rico was left out of the Pandemic EBT [Electronic Benefits Transfer] program that was enacted in March to provide additional food aid to school children across the country who are missing free and reduced-price meals due to school closures.” Unlike other parts of the country, Puerto Rico entered the novel coronavirus pandemic after more than a decade of economic decline coupled with hurricanes, earthquakes, and an unprecedented, ongoing bankruptcy process, the group said. And on top of that, Puerto Rico residents have limited or no access to the nation’s safety net, further exacerbat-

ing hardship. “As CBPP’s new analysis explains, Puerto Rico’s nutrition assistance program [PAN by its Spanish acronym] is already woefully inadequate when compared with the SNAP program,” the CBPP pointed out. “[PAN] can’t expand to serve more people to meet rising needs in the face of natural disasters or economic downturns. Consequently, Puerto Rico

must rely on Congress to increase benefits –- which they did in 2017 –- but the additional funding will be exhausted in August. Without more funding, millions of American citizens in Puerto Rico will suffer greatly from these steep benefit reductions. “That’s why policymakers must include a boost in nutrition funding for Puerto Rico in the next COVID-19 relief package.”

Business groups: Permitting law changes should be taken up in special By THE STAR STAFF

usiness groups demanded Tuesday the inclusion in the special legislative session of a bill that would simplify the permitting process. “The Single Permit platform is a resounding failure,” noted Jorge Argüelles Morán, president of the United Retailers Association (CUD by its Spanish acronym) as he demanded the government deal with the problem. “Now there are more problems than before; resources and money were lost in a system that hurts the bona fide merchant, who only wants to support his family and promote the economic development of Puerto Rico.” The island’s main business organizations, such as the CUD, the Chamber of Food Marketing, Industry and Distribution (MIDA), the Puerto Rico Chamber of Commerce, the Gasoline Retailers Association, Entre-

preneurs for PR, the Chamber of Industrial Signs and Advertisements, the Association of Inspection Centers, Coopharma, the Puerto Rico Funeral Homes Association and the Federation of Long-Term Care Institutions, among others, have been trying for months to push for the approval of the House Bill 2404, which aims to solve the problem of the Joint Permits Regulation. House Bill 2404 amends the permits reform of 2009 to simplify the permitting process, including by reducing paperwork. “From the beginning we have raised concerns about the regulations that have been enacted, due to the adverse impact they have on the operations of the business sector,” Argüelles said in a statement. “To this end, we have held various meetings and participated in work forums at the level of the Legislature and the Department of State to air concerns and discuss possible

solutions. However, it was surprising that the measure was left out of the special session that the governor convened, and time is running out.” MIDA Executive Vice President Manuel Reyes said the Single Permit platform is not only incompatible with the purpose of the law, but also has harmed business sectors since it doubles, and in some cases triples, the costs of doing business. “The law was intended to make the process simpler and more agile, but the reality is that the process is now more complex, where the business is required to present more than 16 documents, as if it were a new permit application,” Reyes said. “This, when the Single Permit is supposed to be a simple registry where all the permits and operating licenses in the sector would be consolidated, for simplicity. The result has been entirely the contrary.”

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 29, 2020

Local Democratic Party leaders contest primary results in court By JOHN McPHAUL jpmcphaul@gmail.com

eps. Rafael “Tatito” Hernández Montañez and José “Conny” Varela filed an injunction in San Juan Superior Court earlier this week against State Elections Commission (SEC) President Juan Ernesto Dávila Rivera and Popular Democratic Party and Democratic Party leader Charlie Rodríguez for allegedly illegally certifying the final results of the delegates in the Democratic presidential primaries held July 12 in Puerto Rico. “Through this legal recourse, we have requested that a decree be issued prohibiting the defendant from proceeding to the appointment of delegates contained in the certification of July 20, 2020,” Hernández said. “Likewise, that it be ordered to order the Democratic Party of Puerto Rico to designate, proportionally, the delegates among the candidates who obtained support of at least 15 percent in each senatorial district, as required by the rules of the Central Committee of the Democratic Party (DNC).” “We proceeded to alert both Charlie Rodríguez and the president of the State Elections Commission, Juan Ernesto Dávila Rivera, about the mistake they made in certifying delegates who do not comply with the recently approved Law 58-2020, known as ‘New Code Electoral de Puerto Rico de 2020,’ or with DNC regulations; however, the current

Rep. Rafael ‘Tatito’ Hernández president of the Democratic Party on the island limited himself to answering that he had no legal authority to change the certifications made by the SEC, so he would have to endorse the certification issued,” he added. “For this reason, we will be challenging him in court.” The lawsuit states that the Presidential Primary Act of 1979 was repealed by the New Electoral Code of Puerto Rico of 2020 (Law 58-2020) on June 20, so that on the day of the primary it was already in force. It also claims the violation of articles 8.1 and 8.20.b of the same law, which regulates everything related to presidential primaries in Puerto Rico.

“As is clear from the recently approved Law 58-2020, its Article 8.12.a provides that: ‘[t] he selection of delegates, alternate delegates or both, shall be governed by the regulations and rules of the National Parties,’” Varela said. “On the other hand, Article 8.17a (2) does not authorize the SEC to intervene in the adjudication of delegates. It establishes that ‘The General Scrutiny completed, the Presidential Primary Commission will notify the president of the National State Party, the president of the National Party and all the Presidential Applicants who have appeared on the ballot paper of their respective primaries, the results in terms of absolute numbers of each candidacy.’” Varela added that “on March 2, 2020, Mrs. Patrice Taylor of the DNC sent a memorandum reiterating that the methodology adopted for the DNC presidential primaries, called ‘ranked-choice voting,’ prevents a candidate who does not obtain at least 15 percent support in a given district from accumulating delegates in that district, a formula that has been widely commented on and discussed in political circles.” “As we have already observed, only [former] Vice President Biden exceeded 15 percent support globally and at the level of the 8 Senate districts, [former New York City Mayor Michael] Bloomberg managed to reach 15 percent support in the Ponce District (16.05 percent) and in

the Humacao District ( 22.01 percent),” Varela said. “Therefore, it is impossible to certify, as the Presidential Primary Commission tried to do, delegates who represent Bloomberg in the senatorial districts of San Juan, Bayamón, Arecibo, Mayagüez-Aguadilla, Guayama and Carolina.” Meanwhile, Hernández said that “in the face of Charlie Rodríguez’s lack of compliance, Patrice Taylor once again informed him that rule 14 of the DNC provides that the selection of delegates must be in accordance with the expressed reflection of the presidential preference and if the level of preference in a district has passed 15 percent, a delegate is awarded proportionally.” “If you do not meet the 15 percent threshold, no delegate would be assigned to you,” he said. “Therefore, she recommended that the results be corrected in order to avoid being contested.” The plaintiffs noted that “[b]oth Law No. 58-2020 (New Electoral Code) and the last Presidential Primary Law required something that did not happen, which was that the assignment of delegates was carried out in accordance with the provisions of the National Regulations of the Party.” “Given Charlie Rodríguez’s refusal to correct the results and comply with the rules of the National Democratic Party, we have filed a permanent injunction,” they said.

AMPR recommends remote work for teachers By JOHN McPHAUL jpmcphaul@gmail.com

aking into consideration complaints from the teaching profession and observing how cases of COVID-19 continue to rise on the island, the president of the Puerto Rico Teachers Association (AMPR by its Spanish initials), along with representatives of the association’s union, recommended to Education Secretary Eligio Hernández on Tuesday that the best option is for teachers to continue working from their homes at least until the end of the year. “In recent days, the Department of Education (DE) announced the plan to return to school in the face of the pandemic, and several alternatives were discussed,” AMPR President Elba Aponte Santos said at a press conference. “Certainly, the situation is not

easy because we have many teachers who have their health compromised and we are not going to expose them.” Aponte Santos said no teacher should be called to report to her or his campus until the Education Department conducts molecular tests like those administered to other employees. “If the teachers were to work in person, the first thing is to do the COVID-19 tests as they did with other DE employees,” she said. “The tests are necessary in case you have to return in person.” GrichelleToledo, secretary general of the AMPR-Local Union, added that “the reality is that teachers also have children and at school ages, so we believe that, ideally, teachers should be allowed to work remotely.” “This would help teachers who have children to be more relaxed doing their

work remotely, while helping their children,” Toledo said. Aponte Santos added that “the idea is that teachers who want to work from their workplace can do it and those who have the need for remote work can do so.”

“In addition, we suggest that a health and safety committee be appointed at each school,” she said. “This committee must have a teacher from each level and category, and the delegate of the AMPR-Local Union must also be included.”

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 29, 2020

Here are the differences between the House and Senate Coronavirus relief bills By EMILY COCHRANE

ith the economic and public health toll of the coronavirus pandemic continuing to mount across the country, members of Congress are debating another round of federal relief for individuals and businesses. But it remains unclear how Democrats and Republicans will reconcile their vastly different proposals. They are staring down a tight deadline, with tens of millions of Americans slated to lose their enhanced jobless aid this week. Senate Republicans and administration officials Monday unveiled a $1 trillion proposal, narrowly tailored to Republican priorities. It includes slashing by two-thirds the $600-per-week unemployment payments that workers have received since April and providing tax cuts and liability protections for businesses. House Democrats in May approved a $3 trillion relief package that amounts to their opening offer: a sweeping measure that contains a number of Democratic priorities, including an extension of the jobless aid, nearly $200 billion for rental assistance and mortgage relief, $3.6 billion to bolster election security and additional aid for food assistance. Speaker Nancy Pelosi of California has said that she plans to fight for even more funding, particularly for schools, in negotiations with Republicans. Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the majority leader, has warned against letting the price tag rise beyond $1 trillion, particularly as many Republicans question the merits of approving any additional aid. While administration officials have floated the prospect of speeding through a short-term, narrow measure to address the looming expiration of unemployment benefits, liability protections and funding for schools, Democrats have panned that suggestion in favor of a comprehensive package. Here are some of the main points of contrast that are likely to emerge as sticking points. — Democrats want to extend $600 weekly jobless payments, while Republicans want to slash them. The $2.2 trillion stimulus law added a $600-per-week supplement for those on unemployment insurance, but conservatives have argued that it discourages people from returning to work in certain states because it exceeds their normal wages. The House bill would extend the full benefit through January, while the Senate measure would severely curtail it, scaling it back to $200 per week. The lump sum would eventually be replaced with a newly calculated benefit that, when combined with state benefits, would be capped at 70% of a worker’s prior income. — Republicans want liability shields for businesses, while Democrats are pressing for protections for workers. House Democrats are again pushing for the Occupational Safety and Health Administration to establish an enforceable standard, based on guidance from top federal health agencies, for workplaces to develop infection-control plans. The House bill would also prevent employers from retaliating against any employee who reports workplace violations. In the Senate, McConnell has repeatedly said that he views strengthening liability protections for businesses, schools and hospitals that remain open during the pandemic as a prerequi-

Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the majority leader, has warned against letting the price tag for virus relief rise beyond $1 trillion. site for any aid bill. The Republican proposal would establish a liability shield for businesses, schools and hospitals from facing claims over episodes related to the coronavirus. — Democrats would allocate $1 trillion for state and local governments. Republicans left them out entirely. Funding for state, local and tribal governments is the centerpiece of the legislation House Democrats approved in May. Democrats argue that governments will need another major infusion of relief to keep essential workers on payrolls and make up for the loss of revenue after decreased tourism and spending during the pandemic. The bill unveiled by Senate Republicans does not have any aid specifically set aside for state, local and tribal governments, though it grants more flexibility for how states spent previously allocated funds. Several conservative lawmakers note that some of the money allocated in the March stimulus law has not yet been spent. Others have warned against states using the coronavirus relief to make up for preexisting debt and expenses. — Both proposals would provide for another round of direct payments to American families. Both proposals would again allocate another round of $1,200 direct payments to American families, duplicating a provision in the stimulus law enacted in March that would phase out the amount of money for individual incomes above $75,000. But the Democratic proposal would allow immigrants in

the country illegally to receive money, undoing language that prohibited payments to anyone who filed taxes jointly with someone who used an Individual Taxpayer Identification Number, a common substitute for a Social Security number. That number is used mostly by immigrants without legal status. Democrats would also increase the amount of money per child to $1,200 for up to three children per family. The Republican proposal would maintain the $500 amount set in the first stimulus but also allow adult dependents to qualify. — The Republican proposal would condition some school funding on reopening, while Democrats would not. Because the Democratic measure was approved in May, before schools were contemplating how to begin another academic year safely with the virus still surging across the country, Pelosi has said she will now push for more than the $100 billion included in the package for education. The Republican bill would allocate $105 billion for states to put toward schools. Of that money, $5 billion would be set aside for governors to use at their discretion, and $30 billion would be set aside for colleges and universities. The remaining $70 billion would go to elementary and secondary schools, with two-thirds of the relief designated for schools that have begun reopening and holding in-person classes. Democrats have so far balked at the prospect of tying federal relief to reopening.

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 29, 2020

Why hunger can grow even when poverty doesn’t

Food insecurity, as defined by the government, includes not only people who lack food but also those whose diets suffer from poor quality or whose access to food is so uncertain it causes them to worry. By JASON DEPARLE

he news about the needy in recent weeks has at times seemed at odds with itself. As surveys find more people are going hungry, evidence suggests that increased federal aid, in response to the pandemic-driven rise in unemployment, has prevented a surge in poverty. How could hunger soar if poverty does not? The possible explanations shed light on how people are faring in the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression. And they bear on the deadlocked policy debate between Congress and President Donald Trump’s administration over whether to continue expanded jobless benefits, which expire in several days. Here’s a guide to understanding hunger and poverty. Poverty is measured annually; people eat daily. In March, Congress approved more than $2 trillion in economic relief, including hundreds of billions of dollars to individuals in direct stimulus payments, nutritional assistance and bigger-than-normal unemployment checks. Multiple analyses have found significant antipoverty effects. Using different models, the Urban Institute and the Center on Poverty and Social Policy at Columbia University both found the spending would prevent more than 10

million people from falling into poverty and keep poverty rates at about pre-crisis levels. (A paper by three economists found poverty rates actually declining.) Under the government’s most sophisticated measure, which varies with local costs of living, a family of four is typically deemed poor with an annual income below about $28,170. The success in limiting the rise in poverty is an important projection. It suggests that help is reaching people who need it and saving them from worse distress. It is consistent with other research that shows that spending among the poorest households has nearly recovered to pre-pandemic levels and risen faster than spending among the affluent. The aid “has been much more effective than I first thought,” said H. Luke Shaefer, who directs the poverty center at the University of Michigan. “It was probably the most effective social safety net response we’ve ever had.” But poverty is a measure of annual income, not whether the income arrives in time to keep people fed. The needy have suffered long delays in receiving some forms of aid, especially jobless benefits. As a result, many have had to trim their grocery lists. While the benefits may lift annual incomes above the poverty line, many may be “food insecure” in the meantime. As

Joseph Baker, a laid-off firearms instructor in Orlando, Florida, put it, “When you need to eat, you need to eat now.” Most people who are food insecure are not poor. Another reason food insecurity can rise when poverty does not is that most food-insecure households are not technically poor. Of the 37 million people the government considered food insecure before the coronavirus pandemic, only 30% had incomes below the poverty threshold, according to Zachary Parolin, a Columbia University researcher. Many more, about 48%, were “near poor,” meaning they had incomes up to twice the poverty line, or $56,340 in a typical city. More than 20% had incomes higher than that. Many are low-wage workers with high expenses, like rent, child care or hospital bills. Others experience blows to household income, like divorce or family deaths. “Food insecurity is really sensitive to income jolts,” said Elaine Waxman, a senior fellow at the Urban Institute. Food insecurity is a broad measure. As defined by the government, it includes not only people who lack food but also those whose diets suffer from poor quality or whose access to food is so uncertain it causes them to worry. The growth of ‘near poverty’ can increase food insecurity. The official definition of poverty is an all-or-nothing measure. It indicates whether a family is below the line — $28,170 for that typical family of four — but not how far below. A pandemic that makes a poor family poorer could increase food insecurity even if it does not change the poverty rate. So could a crisis that increases the number of “near poor,” or people with incomes up to twice the poverty line. Parolin found that the share of near poor who experience food insecurity (22%) was not greatly different than the rate among the poor (29%). A crisis that swells their ranks could increase food insecurity. Many immigrants cannot get aid. Hardship appears to be rising especially fast among immigrants, for at least two reasons. Immigrants in the country illegally are barred from most government aid, so the

safety net expansion has done them little good. They number about 11 million, and about 4 million children who are American citizens live with them in mixed-status families. That means a lot of people are facing the crisis without government help. In addition, the Trump administration, through its new “public charge” rule, is dissuading legal immigrants from seeking aid. The rule allows the government to count the receipt of benefits as a negative factor when immigrants seek permanent residency. It has spread broad fear and confusion, leaving some immigrants reluctant to seek help. While poverty projections should account for such rules, it is not clear if they adequately do so in such unusual times. Food insecurity has grown, but how much is unclear. Data on food insecurity during the pandemic comes from four surveys: three by private researchers and one by the Census Bureau. All suggest elevated hardship, with the largest problems among people of color and families with children. But the degree of the increase is in dispute. A recent survey by the Urban Institute found about 18% of adults were food insecure, up from about 11% by the government’s pre-pandemic count. Diane Schanzenbach, an economist at Northwestern University who analyzed weekly census surveys, puts food insecurity at about 25%, more than twice the pre-crisis level. Lauren Bauer, a fellow at the Brookings Institution looking at severe problems among households with children, found the levels had risen nearly sixfold. Some surveys find hardship easing since early in the pandemic; others do not. At least three issues cloud the results. One is that current surveys have low response rates — less than 5% in the census surveys. That means respondents may not reflect the country overall. In addition, data collection has moved from the phone to internet questionnaires. Any change in methodology could skew results, and people embarrassed by their shortage of food may be more likely to disclose it online. (That would suggest food insecurity before the crisis was higher than previously known.) The number of questions and their wording has also changed, making it hard to compare the results to pre-crisis benchmarks.

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 29, 2020

‘Not sparing anyone’: Texas funeral homes can’t escape virus By EDGAR SANDOVAL

ohnny Salinas Jr., owner of Salinas Funeral Home, typically handles five funerals a week. But on a recent day, with the coronavirus tearing through his community, he saw that many grieving families in a single day. A sixth family was waiting, too. His own. Salinas changed from a polo shirt into a crisp black suit and left his office for the chapel next door. The light blue coffin of his great-uncle, who died of COVID-19, sat at the front of the room, adorned with white flower arrangements and a wooden crucifix. “The virus is not sparing anyone,” Salinas said. “Not even my family.” In the Rio Grande Valley of Texas, where a surge of virus cases has set off a flood of deaths this month, funeral homes — like hospitals — are overloaded and struggling to carry out basic services and keep up with the expanding crisis. Local funeral homes, officials said, have not experienced such demand in decades. About 1 in 60 residents of Hidalgo County is known to have had the virus, and about 1 of every 2,000 people has died from the virus, a New York Times database shows. Hidalgo County now has one of the highest per capita death rates in the state. At the start of July, fewer than 50 deaths in Hidalgo County had been attributed to the virus, according to the database. By Monday, there had been almost 470. “It’s like a bad dream,” said Linda Ceballos, a co-director of Ceballos Funeral Home in McAllen. “You want to wake up, but you can’t.” The death toll is forcing funeral directors to bypass traditional services such as velorios, viewings that sometimes last for days and are filled with prayers, hugs and sorrowful Spanish-language songs. Instead, many funeral homes now are shortening viewing times and limiting attendance. Some have ordered large refrigerator trucks to store bodies until they can get to them. The virus’s spread seemed relatively under control in the area until the state reopened the economy in time for Memorial Day, local health officials said. Richard Cortez, the Hidalgo County judge, said the virus soon was wreaking damage through the region, where chronic disease and widespread poverty were already significant problems. More than 14,000 people have contracted the virus in El Valle, as the area is known to its mostly Latino residents. In desperation, Cortez last week instituted a voluntary stay-at-home order, hoping that it would send a message. “If 10% follow it, we are making progress. We need to protect our grandparents, our aunts, our uncles,” Cortez said in an interview. “Too many people are dying, too many people in misery.” At his great-uncle’s velorio, Salinas, 30, had two roles at once: funeral director and mourning relative. Before family arrived, Salinas paced around the room, making sure it complied with hygiene guidelines. On this day, around the chapel, every other pew was sealed off with blue tape so people would sit apart. A plexi-

glass barrier shielded his great-uncle’s upper body in the open coffin to keep mourners from leaning in. “People tend to want to hug and cry on their loved ones,” Salinas said. Not long after, he talked a family member out of placing a rosary in the hands of Francisco Tafolla Sr., the great-uncle whom Salinas grew up simply calling uncle, who died of the virus at 85. “It’s human instinct to want to touch the body, but they can’t,” he said. “It’s for their safety.” White flower arrangements adorned a wall beside a large photo of Tafolla. Tafolla’s daughter, Gloria Tafolla Gomez, stood silently, nodding her head softly to the lyrics of “Un Dia a la Vez” — “One Day at a Time” — by Tejano band Siggno. “He always delivered what he promised, even if that was a spanking,” Gloria Tafolla Gomez whispered to a relative. They both chuckled. “We were so afraid of him.” Francisco Tafolla, who worked manual jobs in the gas industry, saved money to ensure that all of his 12 children went to college, Gloria Tafolla Gomez Tafolla said. She became a nurse. Family members still do not know how he got the virus. “He never left the house,” said Tafolla, who is 63 and is Salinas’ aunt. Even before the virus, Francisco Tafolla had been battling other medical issues and recently had heart surgery, she said. Days after his first virus symptoms, he was gone. “We kind of knew that if he ended up getting sick, that

he would end up leaving us,” she said. At Ceballos Funeral Home in McAllen, people seeking funerals during the pandemic have to wait several days, sometimes a week, Ceballos said. She has seen young victims, too, she said. “Nothing is like it used to be,” Ceballos said. Aaron Rivera, a funeral director and embalmer at Rivera Funeral Home in McAllen, said he ordered a refrigerated truck with a capacity for about 100 bodies to avoid turning people away. The volume has tripled in the last month, he said. “They don’t get to see their loved ones when they are taken to the hospital,” Rivera said. “They should see them at the funeral.” Salinas has been working around the clock, sleeping only a handful of hours a day. He owns two funeral home locations: one in Hidalgo County and a second in neighboring Cameron County. Smaller funeral homes have been referring grieving families to him when they have no more space. “I tell them, stop sending them,” he said. “We are tired. We haven’t stopped. We need to sleep.” For Salinas, long days have begun to blend, one into the next. When a call came in on a recent afternoon, it was from inside the funeral home. The virus had hit close again. The cousin of a funeral home worker had died from COVID-19. His body waited in the nearby chapel. Salinas excused himself and disappeared down the hall.

The death toll from the coronavirus in the Rio Grande Valley is forcing funeral directors to buy refrigerated trucks and bypass traditional services such as velorios.

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 29, 2020

How local COVID deaths are affecting vote choice By LYNN VAVRECK and CHRISTOPHER WARSHAW

n March 18, Donald Trump declared himself a wartime president against “the invisible enemy” of coronavirus and invoked the Defense Production Act. Now he’s facing a downside of presiding over a war: U.S. casualties. In the days since that pronouncement, COVID-19 has taken the lives of almost 150,000 Americans, many more than have died in recent wars combined. Data from more than 328,692 interviews in 3,025 counties suggest that coronavirusrelated deaths, like casualties of war, are hurting the president’s approval rating and may cost him and his party votes. The gap between stated voting support for Trump and Joe Biden grows by about 2.5 percentage points in Biden’s favor when a county has extremely high levels of coronavirus-related deaths relative to when it has low levels. These changes may come within counties as the number of virusrelated deaths change, or across counties at any given point in time. For example, COVID-19 fatalities exploded in Wayne County in Michigan in April, suggesting a 1.25-point expansion of the gap between Trump and Biden.

Cases in Maricopa County, in Arizona, have nearly quadrupled in the past two months, suggesting an 0.6-point increase in the vote support gap between the candidates. Other places have seen little impact from COVID-19, such as Wyoming and some Plains states. Our data show that Trump has continued to do well in those states, perhaps even increasing his share of the vote in recent months. Republicans running for the U.S. House and Senate lose just as much support as Trump does when deaths rise locally. It may feel as if all politics is national, but it is not. Research shows that when people are killed in action during wartime, residents of the place the victims are from tend to hold elected leaders in Congress and the White House accountable. Political scientists have found this to be true for midterm and presidential elections during the Civil War, the Vietnam War, and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Coronavirus-related deaths seem to be having a similar effect. It’s also true that partisan leanings have influenced views on the nation’s current crises. July data from the Pew Research Center show a wide divide between Democrats and Republicans on coronavirus. Only 46% of Republicans say the out-

break is a major threat to the health of the U.S. public, compared with 85% of Democrats who do. Still, reactions to the pandemic are about more than being a Democrat or Republican. The front lines of the fight against COVID-19 are in local communities where sick people try to get tested and endure quarantine; where some succumb to the disease, often alone; and where doctors fight to provide care. To understand whether these communitylevel experiences are affecting people’s views of the president and his party, we need local-level data on both COVID-19 deaths and people’s views of Trump and his fellow Republicans over time — as the death tolls change place to place. This is a challenge; a typical poll of 1,000 people cannot deliver sufficiently granular data. There are more than 3,000 counties in the country, and the death tolls are changing in each of them in different ways every week. The Democracy Fund + UCLA Nationscape Project has been interviewing 6,250 people a week since July 2019. To date, there are more than 300,000 completed interviews spanning every state and most counties. The survey is conducted online and is fielded by the market research firm Lucid. The data contain more cases in big places like Los Angeles County than in small ones, like Grafton County, New Hampshire, but there are enough people in counties with varying rates of COVID-19 deaths over time to investigate whether a relationship exists. For our analyses, people in the survey are assigned their county’s per-capita 60-day cumulative number of COVID-19 deaths. The 60-day period is that just preceding the date each person was interviewed. In this way, we capture variation in county-level deaths within counties because people in the same county are interviewed on different days. Similarly, because people have been interviewed all over the country on the same dates, we also have captured variation across counties at the same moment. Some counties had high COVID-19 death rates in April, while others did not. As we moved into May and June, a different set of counties experienced rising rates. The goal is to figure out whether the differences in COVID-19 deaths per capita in a county at a given point in time are affecting how people plan to vote in 2020 and how they rate the president. (We also try to account for possible confounding factors that might also be changing broadly at the same time.) The analyses reveal clear patterns across multiple levels of geography (states and counties) and different offices (president, Senate and House). Local coronavirus fatalities are hurting Republicans

running for federal offices. A doubling of cases per capita in a county over the past 60 days drops Trump’s two-party vote margin against Biden by a third of a percentage point — a seemingly small gap, but not when you consider that several recent elections have been won by narrow margins. In 2016, the critical state of Michigan was won by less than a third of a point; Wisconsin and Pennsylvania were won by less than a point. And some places are seeing a tripling or quadrupling of cases. The news for Republicans running for the House and Senate is equally bad. A number of swing Senate elections are in states that have experienced recent rises in COVID-19 cases, including Georgia, Arizona and North Carolina. In Arizona, for example, the gap between Sen. Martha McSally, the Republican, and her Democratic challenger, Mark Kelly, continues to grow as the state has surpassed 3,300 virus-related deaths (up from 941 on June 2). Local virus fatalities are costing Republicans running for Senate as much as they are costing the president, in a year when Republicans are fighting to hold on to a majority in the chamber. There are less than 100 days until Election Day, and many Americans will vote even earlier. Voters appear to be holding the president and his party accountable for the increasing number of deaths in communities around the country. Reducing the toll of the virus is in everyone’s best interest in terms of public health. For Republicans, it is also crucial to their electoral prospects. More on the methodology: The data on virus-related deaths come from The New York Times coronavirus tracking project, which we merge to the Nationscape survey data by county. We tried to account for other factors that might be changing everywhere at the same time, like the Black Lives Matter protests, or things that might be specific to one particular county, like its preexisting level of support for the president. We use a method that controls for these differences across time and across counties, helping us to isolate the effects of COVID-19 deaths on vote. (We also account for some things about the people in the surveys, like their age, race, gender, ethnicity, education and 2016 vote choice). By doing this, we try to be sure that the relationships we’ve uncovered aren’t being driven by characteristics of the people we have interviewed or things like how many Democrats live in a county or the fact that case counts went up at the same time protests swept the nation in many places. The analysis doesn’t account for any national effects of COVID-19. The details of our analyses are laid out in a paper we’ve written with the UCLA Ph.D. student Ryan Baxter-King.

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 29, 2020

Why Delta is leaving middle seats empty during the pandemic By NIRAJ CHOKSHI

he number of people flying today is down about 75% from a year ago. And in the fight to attract those few passengers who remain, airlines have promoted their health and safety policies. Delta Air Lines has tried to stake a claim as one of the most cautious companies in the industry by promising to leave middle seats empty even as American Airlines and United Airlines are selling as many seats as they can. Delta has also said that it cleans planes between flights, tests all employees for the coronavirus and aggressively enforces a mask requirement. On Monday, it announced a partnership with Lysol’s parent company aimed at improving Delta’s cleaning practices. The man responsible for all those initiatives is Bill Lentsch, a 30-year veteran of the airline who is its chief customer experience officer. In an interview, he explained Delta’s approach. Below are edited excerpts from the conversation. Q: What does Delta hope to get out of working with Lysol? A: We hope to tap the 130 years of expertise that Lysol has — to transpose it into the cabin, into the lavatories on board the aircraft, into our facilities. Through our survey data, we hear that our cabins are very clean, but one thing our customers say is, “The lavatories are very clean when we get on board, but how can you keep them clean throughout the flight?” And this is the first area that we are going to target with Lysol, coming up with a product that will help us maintain cleanliness during flight on board the airplane. It doesn’t sound terribly glamorous, but it’s incredibly important to our people. Q: Delta has already teamed up with the Mayo Clinic. How has that partnership informed what you do? A: The Mayo Clinic partnership is phenomenal. They’ve been looking at our practices and policies with a very critical eye. They are also helping us develop our program to test all of our employees, not only the active virus but for the antibodies. Once we have all of our employees baseline tested, who do we then retest, at what frequency, and what are all the factors to determine that? The Mayo Clinic has a very sophisticated algorithm that

Delta has tried to stake a claim as one of the most cautious companies in the industry by promising to leave middle seats empty even as its biggest rivals are selling as many seats as they can. they’re building to help with that. They’re providing general education to our employees and sitting on an advisory panel for us, too, so that we have an opportunity to run new policies, procedures and technologies by them. Q: Let’s take a step back. Few people are traveling these days. Who are they? A: Well, those who are providing essential services have continued to fly throughout the pandemic — doctors, nurses, critical workers who support the economy, government and other key organizations. Also, many must fly personally, whether it’s for a funeral, some small family event, or someone is sick. But business travel is still very depressed. Q: What do customers say they need before they’re willing to fly again? A: They want to be assured that airlines have very comprehensive social distancing and aircraft cleaning policies. But I think the real key to why they aren’t traveling is because restaurants, hotels, car rental facilities, other businesses, either have significant restrictions or aren’t even opened up. They’re not flying just to fly, they’ve got something that they want to do. Q: Delta was early to block middle seats and is going to continue through

September. But that policy doesn’t guarantee 6 feet of distance. Why keep it up? A: Our position all along has been we are going to take a multilayered approach. That means more frequent replacement of the HEPA filters that are part of our air circulation system, enforcing wearing of masks, making sure that we minimize the touch points with our customers and having space between you and the person closest to you. So we are looking to ensure that we are driving the probability of any kind of transmission very, very close to zero. All of the medical guidance we’ve received says that more space is more protective. So, yes, it’s not 6 feet, but it’s better than having someone shoulderto-shoulder with you. Q: How have passenger needs changed during the pandemic? A: Well, the order of priorities is different. Price and schedule flexibility used to be one of the most important factors. While those are still part of the mix, customers have placed the highest priority on two things: social distancing, whether that’s in the airport, lobbies, gate areas, jet bridges or on board the airplane, and cleanliness. Q: You’ve continued to fly weekly during the pandemic. How has that in-

formed your work? A: It’s interesting because while I have my eyes on the operation, we have flight attendants and pilots and gate agents and others who are on board that aircraft every minute of every day. They hear from our customers in ways that we may not through a survey. For example, the decision that we made months ago to start boarding the airplane from back to front rather than by zones. That came from a flight attendant who heard from a customer in first class, who said, “Maybe you should put us on last because everyone who is sitting behind me is walking right by me.” Q: Delta and other airlines have already implemented a lot of new health and safety policies. What more is there to do? A: This is why we partnered with Lysol and the Mayo Clinic. We want to hear from them. We’re looking for a critical eye to help us fill any gaps and push the boundaries. It is my opinion that in three to six months, there are going to be some products on our airplanes that I’m not even contemplating right now. And, by the way, we’re never going to be done with this. We’ve built an organization at Delta, a global cleanliness division with a vice president of the company who leads it, and the purpose is solely to continue to push the boundaries of cleanliness and sanitization and protection for our customers and our employees. Q: Delta has brought back alcohol, restored automatic upgrades for elite members and reopened some lounges. Do customers still care about these kinds of perks? A: Not all of them do, but some of them do. And this is where we really have to evaluate the feedback. But one thing is very clear for us, and we make this very clear to our customers: We will not compromise their safety. We’ll listen to their feedback and take action, provided we can find a way to do it safely. In some cases, we’ve had to say no for the time being. In other cases, like the limited beer and wine offering we started this month in first class and comfort plus, we found a way to serve that without adding any more touch points between our flight attendants and our customers.

Wednesday, July 29, 2020

The San Juan Daily Star

Hotels are promoting the nostalgia of the family road trip

One of the Fairmont Scottsdale Princess Hotel’s drive-in movie nights, with family-friendly cartoons and comedies playing in its parking lot, in Scottsdale, Ariz., July 2, 2020. By MARTHA C. WHITE

s the United States slowly, haltingly reopens, hotels are trying to persuade Americans to make this the summer of the road trip. Although some hotels have kept a trickle of guests coming through the doors by catering to essential workers, people seeking a change in scenery and willing to drive to a vacation spot are the industry’s lifeline for the foreseeable future. A good number of hotels in the country remain closed. Most business travel and nearly all group bookings remain on hold, and many travelers are reluctant to take unnecessary plane trips. “Everything that we’ve seen and read was pointing to the summer of the drive market and drive destinations,” said John Davies, vice president of marketing at Benchmark Resorts & Hotels. Jan Freitag, senior vice president for STR, a lodging consulting firm, agreed that many people would want to drive somewhere after months of being largely stuck at home. “It’s not going to be very hard to convince people to drive because they just want to get away,” he said. So, hotel marketing campaigns are leaning into nostalgia, invoking the familiar tropes of the family car ride to a beach, the mountains or a national park. “This is really going back 50 years or more when people were very eager to get in the car and drive,” said Chekitan Dev, professor of

marketing and branding at the School of Hotel Administration at Cornell University. While the campaigns may evoke an earlier era, hotel marketing departments are interacting with would-be travelers on social media and using web browsing data analytics to figure out which images, activities and places people search for when they think about a getaway. Benchmark rolled out a summer road trip campaign that divides the U.S. into seven regions, highlighting outdoor activities and local attractions in each. “We felt that all they needed was the motivation to give them a reason to leave the house,” Davies said. “We put a huge focus on that with a message that’s more comforting and uplifting and kind of inviting for people to kind of get away from the chaos of the crisis.” That is a shift from the messaging hotels rolled out during the initial surge of the pandemic in the spring, when their marketing was largely focused on cleanliness. Hotel chains promoted their stepped-up sanitation standards and partnerships with cleaning product brands like Lysol and Mr. Clean. The first step was moving toward something a bit more optimistic. “We knew that once the industry and our company had established the fact that we were adhering to strict cleanliness standards, that could become a little bit of an assumption that the consumer would make,” said Jeff Do-

ane, senior vice president of sales and marketing for Accor North and Central America. “With that established, we were able to be much more promotional about the experience you’d be able to have at the hotels.” Accor recently started a campaign with tongue-in-cheek depictions of people snorkeling in the bathtub and lounging in a pool float on the living room carpet. “What we found in the search results and feedback we were getting from guest experiences is people just wanted to get out of the house,” Doane said. Hotel brands have also had to adjust to the uneven patchwork of plans and protocols imposed by state and local governments, along with the suspension or even reversal of opening-up plans. “Not everything is accelerating or coming back as fast,” Davies said, which is why Benchmark used what he called a “hyper-regional” approach. The focus on regional and short-haul markets is changing how hotels communicate with travelers and giving a much bigger role to social media channels. “The messages are getting a little bit more specific,” said Bjorn Hanson, a hotel industry consultant. “This is a property-byproperty environment — each really has to have its own unique messaging.” Given that many pools, spas, gyms and restaurants remain closed or are operating in only a limited capacity, hotels are promoting nearby parks, scenery and vistas along with simple activities that are easy to do while maintaining social distance. The Fairmont Scottsdale Princess in Arizona has held drive-in movie nights, playing familyfriendly cartoons and comedies in its parking lot, while Kimpton hotels in Winston Salem, North Carolina, and Los Angeles created pop-up “bodegas” with premade snacks and bottled cocktails for guests while their restaurants were shuttered. “The promotion message is easy, but delivering the experience is a challenge,” Hanson said. Figuring out where people daydream about going is another key part of the equation. Hotels are using data points like Google search results and the addresses of the people doing the searching to see what — and where — they are viewing. “We’re in a situation where most of our traditional data signals don’t really help us in the current environment,” said Julia Vander Ploeg, global head of digital at Hyatt Hotels Corporation. “We’ve had to get very creative and layer on different data points to understand how to promote this gradual rebuild of leisure travel.” Kathleen Reidenbach, chief commercial officer at Kimpton Hotels & Resorts, said Kimpton started by asking guests, “Where are you looking to travel?” When people responded to surveys or queries posted on social media that they wanted to visit pools and beaches, she said, the brand worked with individual properties to play up their aquatic offerings. “As you go to our website, there is a lot of content about beach destinations, and now we’ve pivoted a lot of imagery over to the pool. It’s really impacted our content strategy,” she said.

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 29, 2020

13 Stocks

Wall Street pauses on waning consumer confidence, weak earnings, small stimulus, virus worries

he Dow and Nasdaq were in decline on Tuesday while the S&P eked out a small gain as investors eyed weakening consumer confidence and disappointing business updates as well as a smaller than hoped for coronavirus aid plan from U.S. Senate Republicans. Weighing down the Dow, industrial conglomerate 3M Co (MMM.N) dropped 4.5% after reporting a secondquarter plunge in demand across its businesses and McDonald’s Corp (MCD.N) fell 2.2% after a surprisingly big drop in global same-store sales. Data released in the morning showed U.S. consumer confidence ebbed in July as coronavirus infections flared up across the country. “It’s a little bit of a lot of things,” said Mark Luschini, chief investment strategist at Janney Montgomery Scott in Philadelphia. He called the consumer survey “unsettling” evidence that “individuals are increasingly concerned about the recent surge in coronavirus impacting their finances and their mobility.” Luschini also worried about prospects for a U.S. pandemic aid package. The $1 trillion aid proposal announced on Monday by Senate Republicans, four days before millions of Americans lose unemployment benefits, met opposition by members of both parties. “There has be tremendous compromise from both parties to get to some agreement,” he said, noting a congressional recess scheduled for August adds deadline pressure. “It’s particularly critical at this time since the market is really feeding off the largess that’s been expended by fiscal and monetary authorities,” he said. At 2:18 p.m. ET, the Dow Jones Industrial Average .DJI fell 56.13 points, or 0.21%, to 26,528.64, the S&P 500 .SPX gained 1.11 points, or 0.03%, to 3,240.52 and the Nasdaq Composite .IXIC dropped 36.80 points, or 0.35%, to 10,499.46. Materials .SPLRCM and Energy .SPNY were the biggest percentage decliners of the S&P’s 11 major sectors. Defensive real estate .SPLRCR and utilities .SPLRCU sectors were the biggest gainers. The U.S. Federal Reserve was expected to reiterate its accommodative stance when it wraps up its two-day policy meeting on Wednesday afternoon. On Tuesday, the Fed said it would extend several lending facilities through year end, a sign the pandemic’s economic impact has been longer than expected.

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Wednesday, July 29, 2020

The San Juan Daily Star

South Korea says it will launch spy satellites as missile deal is revised By CHOE SANG-HUN

he South Korean government said Tuesday that it would begin work on launching its own military surveillance satellites to monitor North Korea, after negotiating a loosening in an agreement with the United States that limits the kind of rockets it is permitted to develop. South Korea and the United States have just finished negotiations to revise their missile guidelines, first signed in 1979, under which Washington maintained tight restrictions on what type of missiles and rockets Seoul could develop, Kim Hyun-jong,

a senior national security aide to President Moon Jae-in, said in a news briefing Tuesday. Kim denied that the easing of the missile guidelines had been part of negotiations over how much South Korea should pay annually to help cover the cost of keeping 28,500 U.S. troops in the South. President Donald Trump has insisted on a sharp increase from this year’s 1.04 trillion won ($866 million), accusing South Korea of not spending enough for its own defense. Under the revised guidelines, Kim said, Washington has removed the limit on how powerful solid-fuel rockets that South

A display of missiles used by the South Korean Air Force at the War Memorial of Korea museum in Seoul. The country’s missile arsenal is tightly restricted under a 1979 deal with the United States.

Korea can build to launch space vehicles. Solid-fuel rockets are much easier to store and handle than their liquid-fuel counterparts, making them ideal for missile engines. The lifting of the cap allows South Korea to build powerful rockets with potential applications for long-range ballistic missiles. Seoul remained obliged not to build ballistic missiles with a range of more than 800 kilometers, or 497 miles, Kim said, but hoped to start launching low-orbit military surveillance satellites using its own solid-fuel rockets within the next several years. “I cannot go into classified military details, but I can tell you that we will soon have many low-orbit military satellites with excellent surveillance capabilities monitoring the Korean Peninsula from the sky 24 hours a day,” Kim said. South Korea has no military satellites of its own, relying instead on U.S. spy satellites to monitor North Korea. But with Trump questioning the merit of keeping U.S. troops in South Korea even as the North’s nuclear and missile capabilities have rapidly expanded, Seoul has struggled to augment its own abilities to counter the North Korean threat. South Korea plans to deploy five military reconnaissance satellites by 2023 at a cost of $1 billion, the national news agency Yonhap reported. On Tuesday, Kim said that South Korea has lacked “eyes and ears” despite its $41.6 billion defense budget, partly blaming restrictions in the missile guidelines. Under those guidelines, the United States provided South Korea with technical help in building missiles. But it also imposed restrictions on missile developments because of concern over a regional arms race. The guidelines have been revised three times before. In 2012, as the North’s missile threat increased, the United States agreed to let South Korea possess solid-fuel ballistic missiles with a range of up to 497 miles as long as the payload did not exceed 500 kilograms, or about half a ton. In 2017, the United States lifted the payload limit. But South Korea is still banned from developing ballistic missiles with a range of more than 497 miles. South Korea test-launched a new short-range ballistic missile, Hyunmoo-4, in March. The missile had a 497-mile range but was designed to carry a payload of up to 2 tons, according to South Korean news media.

Taliban announce brief cease-fire, as Afghan peace talks appear imminent By MUJIB MASHAL

he Taliban said Tuesday that they would observe a three-day cease-fire this week during the Muslim festival of Eid al-Fitr, as Afghanistan’s president suggested the long-delayed talks between his government and the insurgents over ending the war could start in a week. The developments promise to inject new optimism into a peace process that was floundering with disagreements over a prisoner swap and increased insurgent attacks, even as the United

States continues to withdraw troops from Afghanistan. In a statement, the Taliban said they had ordered the group’s fighters “not to carry out any kind of attacks against the enemy” during the three days and nights of the Muslim festival and to “retaliate strongly” only if attacked. The Taliban announcement came soon after the Afghan president, Ashraf Ghani, said a prisoner swap that had faced opposition from his government would be completed and that direct negotiations with the Taliban would start in a week. Under a deal signed between the United States and the

Taliban in February, which initiated the phased withdrawal of U.S. troops, direct peace negotiations between the Afghan sides were conditioned on swapping 5,000 Taliban prisoners with 1,000 Afghan security forces held by the insurgents. The Afghan government, left out of those talks, had vehemently opposed any agreement made on its behalf for such a measure. But with President Donald Trump’s administration increasing pressure and the drawdown of U.S. forces, the Afghan government found little choice but to cooperate with the prisoner swap.

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 29, 2020

Australia says Chinese students are targets in ‘virtual kidnapping’ scams By DAMIEN CAVE

he young woman’s parents in China believed the video was real. It seemed to show their 21-yearold daughter pleading for help somewhere in Australia. She had been out of touch for days. She looked to be in pain, and the perpetrators pointed to only one solution: a six-figure ransom payment. The woman’s family deposited the money in an offshore bank account. But it was all a scam. A few hours after the woman’s housemate contacted police in Sydney on July 14, she was found safe and sound at a hotel, where she had been lured by the scam artists. Now, Australian authorities are warning that “virtual kidnappings” could be on the rise as anonymous criminals seek to exploit Chinese students in the country and their families back home, many of whom are already on edge and isolated because of the coronavirus pandemic. On Tuesday, police in New South Wales said there had been at least eight confirmed cases this year, with more than $2 million paid in ransom for abductions that never happened. “The victims of virtual kidnappings we have engaged are traumatized by what has occurred, believing they have placed themselves, and their loved ones, in real danger,” said Peter Thurtell, assistant commissioner of the New South Wales police force. The recent spree points to the evolution of a crime that exploits oversharing and fear for a distant loved one with digital savvy and old-fashioned coercion by con artists. Since at least the 1990s, criminal gangs from Taiwan and China to Mexico and Cuba have been persuading families to pay ransom for simulated kidnappings, often with personal information provided intentionally or unintentionally by the victims. Last year, extortionists called hotel rooms on the American side of the U.S.-Mexico border and convinced guests that armed enforcers were nearby and that they needed to drive across the border and switch to a Mexican hotel, where they had to take a screenshot of themselves that the criminals then used to persuade loved ones to pay a ransom. In the Sydney form of the scam, which authorities said they first started seeing a few years ago, robocalls deliver messages to thousands of random phones purporting to be from a messenger service. It says a package needs to be delivered. Those who continue on the call are greeted by someone speaking Mandarin who asks for basic identity information — name, address, phone number, anything else of import — and promises to call back. For the Chinese students in Australia — whose ranks have swelled in recent years, with 212,000 enrolled last year — the return calls have come from someone who claims to be from the Chinese gover-

Some scammers pretended to be from the Chinese Embassy in Canberra, Australia. nment, bearing bad news: The supposed package to be delivered holds illegal contents or is somehow connected to a larger crime that could get that person deported or imprisoned, or get one of their relatives hurt. To be safe, the caller tells the mark, the person must check into a hotel and turn off the phone. And, oh, don’t tell anyone or else what’s already bad will become downright horrific. “Especially for Chinese students, here without any support from family, they get scared when they get information like this,” said professor Lennon Chang, a senior lecturer in criminal justice at Monash University who has studied the scam. “The talented criminals understand this psychological emotion and use it as a way to lead the students under the pass.” The scammers use technology to bolster the fraud. Chang said they usually mask where they call from, presenting a number from the Chinese Embassy that can be found online. In some cases, they ask the victim to send a photo or alter what they find online to create an image or video that seems to show the person kidnapped. The parents, far away, usually receive the ransom demand by phone and are then sent what appears to be evidence of a crime. Worried about their children, perhaps after reading about actual kidnappings of Chinese students in Canada and in the United States, some parents in

China comply. In one case from Sydney last month, a family paid 2 million Australian dollars ($1.4 million) to the unknown criminals. In the other cases, payments ranged from a few thousand dollars to more than $200,000. “During this period of time, with the pandemic and with less human contact, the parents might not know who to contact if they get a message like that, or for the student, they might not be able to talk to people they trust to verify whether this kind of message is true,” Chang said. “This kind of isolation might create some opportunity for criminals.” When police have been called, it has typically taken them only a few hours to uncover what had really happened. But the names of victims have been rarely publicized, and no masterminds have been identified. On Tuesday, Australian authorities reminded people to report anyone they suspected of pretending to be from the Chinese government. “NSW Police have been assured from the Chinese Consulate-General in Sydney that no person claiming to be from a Chinese authority such as police, procuratorates or the courts will contact a student on their mobile phone and demand monies to be paid or transferred,” Detective Chief Superintendent Darren Bennett said. “If this occurs,” he added, “it is a scam.”

Wednesday, July 29, 2020

Najib Razak, Malaysia’s former prime minister, found guilty in graft trial

The former Malaysian prime minister Najib Razak, center, arriving at the High Court in Kuala Lumpur on Tuesday. By RICHARD D. PADDOCK

or 45 years, Najib Razak was a master of Malaysia’s cutthroat politics. The son and nephew of prime ministers, he was elected to Parliament at 22 and rose to the country’s highest office. As prime minister he was all but untouchable — critics called him the “Man of Steal” — even as $4.5 billion disappeared from a government investment fund he controlled. On Tuesday, he was finally held to account. After years of allegations that he pilfered government coffers to lead a life of excess and luxury, he was found guilty on seven corruption counts and sentenced to up to 12 years in prison and fined nearly $50 million. The sentence was stayed pending appeal. The sweeping verdict was a stunning setback for Najib, whose political party had recently returned to power after forcing out the reformist government that won elections in 2018. His political foes applauded the verdict and praised the independence of the trial court. But experts said the verdict could be overturned on appeal in what is likely to be a yearslong process. The severity of the sentence came as a surprise to some, after the government recently cut a deal with Najib’s stepson that allowed him to keep millions of dollars that

were believed to have been stolen from the same Malaysia Development Berhad fund. Tuesday’s trial was the first of five related to the theft of billions from the investment fund, commonly known as 1MDB, and Najib was found guilty on all seven charges of abuse of power, breach of trust and money laundering. The stolen money was traced by prosecutors to the purchases of a mega-yacht and a Picasso painting, as well as an investment in the Hollywood blockbuster “The Wolf of Wall Street.” About $1 billion of the money ended up in Najib’s personal bank accounts, creating the national scandal that led to the ouster of his party, the United Malays National Organization, in elections two year ago. The court rejected Najib’s defense that the theft was carried out without his knowledge by Jho Low, a wealthy Malaysian businessman who is accused of masterminding the crime and remains an international fugitive. “After considering all evidence in this trial, I find that the prosecution has successfully proven its case beyond a reasonable doubt,” said Judge Mohamad Nazlan Mohamad Ghazali of the Kuala Lumpur High Court. Before the sentence was pronounced, Najib appealed to the judge for leniency, noting his contributions as a public official and that the country prospered during his

nine years as prime minister. He said he did not solicit the $9.8 million payment nor was it offered to him. Najib, 67, still faces dozens of additional charges. Many of the charges against him carry a sentence of up to 20 years in prison. Najib remains a member of Parliament, and his party, popularly known as UMNO, returned to power in February, improving the chances that he will not have to spend time behind bars. His conviction could undermine the credibility of the current government headed by his ally, Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin, which came to power without an election and holds a bare majority in Parliament. In this trial, Najib faced seven charges of money laundering, criminal breach of trust and abuse of power for illegally receiving transfers of $9.8 million from SRC International, a former unit of the investment fund commonly known as 1MDB. The sentence included 12 years for the abuse of power and 10 years for each of the other charges. In Malaysia, sentences run concurrently, so the maximum he would serve would be 12 years in prison. Najib will not lose his seat in Parliament, but he would be prohibited from running for reelection unless his convictions are overturned on appeal. The court rejected the defense contention that he was a victim of a scam and did not know that money from the government fund had been deposited in his personal account. The judge also rejected the argument that Najib received the money as a gift from a Saudi royal and that he was unaware of the balance in his own account. “It would be extraordinary that the accused as the then-prime minister and finance minister did not know it,” said Nazlan, who presided over the 14-month trial. In rejecting Najib’s defense and questioning his credibility, the judge cast doubt on whether the former prime minister’s legal strategy can be effective in his upcoming trials, which will focus on much larger amounts of money that went missing from 1MDB. The opposition leader of Parliament, Anwar Ibrahim, applauded the verdict and said justice had been served. “For over a decade the 1MDB scandal has been a blight on our nation’s reputation and has been the source of much anguish

for the Malaysian people,” he said. “Money which should have been utilized for development and assisting the poor was diverted to illicit gains benefiting a former prime minister and his friends.” Najib’s lead defense lawyer, Muhammad Shafee Abdullah, characterized his client as a victim of his political foes and asked the court for a light sentence because of Najib’s lifetime in public service. He said Najib had spent only a tiny fraction of the stolen money on himself, with nearly half going for political purposes and another 14% to charity. After appearing in court, Najib told supporters gathered outside that he is optimistic he will prevail on appeal. “This is definitely not the end of the world, because there’s a process of appeal, and we hope that we would be successful there,” he said. “The effort will continue, and to my supporters, I hope they will continue to believe in me, believe in our struggle, and continue to be in positive and high spirits.” In May, prosecutors dropped moneylaundering charges against Najib’s stepson, Hollywood producer Riza Aziz, who was accused of receiving $248 million in government funds. The producer of “The Wolf of Wall Street,” Riza was allowed to walk away with $83 million under the terms of the agreement with the new attorney general, Idrus Harun. Last week, the new government and Goldman Sachs reached a $3.9 billion settlement over the company’s role in the scandal. The previous government had sought more than $2.7 billion in fines and had charged more than a dozen executives with fraud. Under the settlement, criminal charges against the bank and the executives were dismissed. Mahathir Mohamad, 95, who was prime minister from 1981 to 2003, came out of retirement in May 2018 to defeat Najib and UMNO, the party that Mahathir once led. After the election, authorities raided properties owned by Najib and his wife, Rosmah Mansour, and seized more than $270 million in cash, jewelry, luxury handbags, tiaras and other valuables. Rosmah also faces corruption charges. Mahathir pledged to pursue justice against Najib and his cronies, but he lost support within his coalition and stepped down in February.

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 29, 2020

In Russia’s far East, a new face of resistance to Putin’s reign By ANTON TROIANOVSKI

alentin Kvashnikov, a construction worker and recovering heroin addict, lives near the railway depot in a wooden shack, with a plastic trash can in the corner that serves as his toilet. But he has risen from obscurity into a celebrity in far eastern Russia by helping to energize the anti-government demonstrations that have gotten bigger and bolder in the past three weeks. “It’s him!” a passing woman, Natasha Gordiyenko, said after she spotted Kvashnikov outside his house Sunday, before unleashing a tirade of profanity against Russian officialdom. The protests in Khabarovsk reached well into the tens of thousands over the weekend, establishing this distant city — some 4,000 miles from Moscow — as the site of the biggest popular challenge to President Vladimir Putin’s authority that a city in Russia’s far-flung regions has produced in his 20 years in power. The protests have no leader and few concrete demands. But they have electrified a quiet city half a world away from the capital, turning apolitical residents into activists overnight and showing how quickly the embers of discontent over corruption, poverty and the stranglehold of Putin’s rule can ignite a conflagration. “It’s not that there is something wrong with us,” said Elena Okhrimenko, a retired accountant, who has been protesting with homemade signs along with her husband, a retired truck driver. “We realized that there is something wrong with the country.” The involvement of protesters from a broad cross-section of the city, an eight-hour flight from Moscow and only 15 miles from China, is a new kind of warning for the Kremlin. For years, large-scale protests have mainly been limited to Moscow and St. Petersburg, making them easy to dismiss as the work of an out-of-touch urban elite. Yet the well of popular anger so far from the capital undercuts the Kremlin’s narrative of Putin’s Russia, which he has essentially ruled for the past two decades. Putin won a heavily orchestrated referendum less than a month ago that rewrote the constitution to allow him to stay in office until 2036. But many analysts have called the vote fraudulent, and while pollsters have identified rising discontent among Russians in recent years, the anger has never spilled into the streets with such force outside the nation’s biggest cities.

“For now, society doesn’t appear to be so and put the governor’s yacht on the market. fabric of the state has thinned, and to tear it radicalized as to storm the gates, if you will,” Kvashnikov, the construction worker, requires less and less effort.” said Tatiana Stanovaya, a nonresident scholar found a wellspring of people who shared his Putin remains in control of the country’s at the Carnegie Moscow Center, a research disdain for Putin and what he sees as a system powerful security services, and, though in organization focused on politics and policy. that enriches the few. He has scarcely enough decline, his approval rating stands at 60%. A “But from my point of view, that is only a ques- money to eat, he said, and had been involved major question is to what extent the Kremlin tion of time if the authorities are not able to in criminal groups and done time in prison in will be prepared to use force to put down see what is really happening in the country.” an earlier life. protests — it has done so in Moscow but not Kvashnikov, long struggling with poverty “You rabid dog, why don’t you deal yet in Khabarovsk. At one point Monday, a and grousing at the state’s injustice, turned into with what is under your own nose?” he said sole police officer followed the column of a bullhorn-carrying cheerleader of protesters of Putin. “Your people are hungry. Look at roughly 1,000 protesters, apparently to keep who have marched through the city each how your people live.” the cars at bay. day since July 11 in defense of their popular Kvashnikov drew the attention of the Many protesters assume that some police governor, Sergei I. Furgal, who was arrested many YouTubers livestreaming the protests by officers sympathize with them. Analysts also by federal authorities this month. his almost daily attendance, his loud chants say that the Kremlin seems to be hoping the The protesters gather in Lenin Square and his readiness to defy police. In one widely protests will fade on their own, and the state in front of the marble-sheathed hulk of the viewed video, he can be seen shouting at a media has largely ignored them. Meanwhile, regional government headquarters — known police officer that the Russian Constitution authorities seem to be putting pressure on locally as the White House — before spilling guarantees freedom of assembly. The crowd some activists. Late Sunday in Lenin Square, videos into the road for a 3-mile loop above the next to him starts chanting “We’re the ones showed Kvashnikov haranguing a man in sprawling Amur River. in charge here!” Cars honk in support, drivers offer highThe crowds of demonstrators have grown plainclothes who he said had threatened him, fives and marveling bystanders — the ice cream for three consecutive Saturdays, with some then being wrestled to the ground by other vendor, the cosmetics shop security guard, the estimates putting last weekend’s crowd at people in plainclothes; he was carried by his officer in front of the railway-company building more than 50,000 — a spurt of spontaneous ankles, chest and elbows to a waiting police car. Hours later, authorities released Kvash— have their phones out to record the scene. political activism that is rare in Russia. “I never believed our people were Furgal’s popularity as a regional elected nikov. Waiting video bloggers were there so united,” Kvashnikov said, describing the official is unique, so the Khabarovsk protests to record his walk from the police station. protests. are not likely to be replicated elsewhere, social Kvashnikov had already let his fans know that The protests have drawn their ranks from scientist Sergei Belanovsky wrote recently. But he was taking a break from protesting, for his political novices like Elena Skorodumova, a they show an increased willingness to protest family’s safety. “Don’t be afraid and keep at it, friends,” 23-year-old kindergarten teacher’s assistant. in response to any number of slights. On July 9, she was scrolling through a social “Given the overall unfavorable economic Kvashnikov said in a video message recorded media page devoted to local news and pets and social situation, the reasons to protest keep Sunday. “Most important, don’t abandon what when she saw a post about the arrest of Furgal, growing in number,” Belanovsky said. “The we started together.” the governor. In a sharp blue suit, Furgal was pictured being led away by a masked Federal Security Service officer in camouflage gear, a gloved hand pressing down on the governor’s head. Skorodumova recalls that she got goose bumps from her anger. The “only way” to support the governor, she wrote in the comments, was to “go out in the streets.” The arrest of the governor, on suspicion of having organized murders some 15 years ago, seemed to many residents a blatant power play by the Kremlin to get rid of a regional leader seen as insufficiently loyal. Furgal, a former scrap metal trader, defeated the incumbent, a widely disliked ally of Putin’s, in the 2018 regional election. Then Furgal won over residents with a populist style that his staff assiduously documented on Instagram. Officially dismissed by Putin last week, Furgal had highlighted how he set aside millions Protesters marching in Khabarovsk, Russia, on Monday, July 27, 2020, in support of the of dollars for school lunches, cut his own pay region’s popular governor, Sergei Furgal.

Wednesday, July 29, 2020

The San Juan Daily Star

NEW YORK TIMES EDITORIAL

What will a post-Trump GOP look like? By BRET STEPHENS

f Donald Trump stages another come-from-behind victory in November — helped, in all likelihood, by the collapse of public order in American cities — the Republican Party will become an oddity for the Trump Organization: the only entity it owns but does not brand. Not only will Trump remain in office for another term, but the Trumpers will also dominate the GOP for another generation. Look for Tom Cotton to be the likely nominee in 2024 (with — why not? — Laura Ingraham as his running mate). And if Trump loses? Then the future of the party will be up for grabs. It’s time to start thinking about who can grab it, who should, and who will. Much depends on the margin of defeat. If it’s razor thin and comes down to a vote-count dispute in a single state, as it did in Florida in 2000, Trump will almost surely allege fraud, claim victory and set off a constitutional crisis. As Ohio State law professor Edward Foley noted last year in a mustread law review article, a state like Pennsylvania could send competing certificates of electoral votes to Congress. Interpretive ambiguities in the 12th Amendment and the Electoral Count Act of 1887 could deadlock the House and the Senate. We could have two self-declared presidents on the eve of next year’s inauguration. Who controls the nuclear football in that event is a

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It will probably take more than one electoral shellacking for conservative-leaning voters to appreciate the scale of disaster that Donald Trump’s presidency inflicted on the party and the country, New York Times columnist Bret Stephens says. question someone needs to start thinking about right now. But let’s assume Trump loses narrowly but indisputably. In that case, the Trump family will do what it can to retain control of the GOP. Tommy Hicks Jr., the current Republican National Committee co-chairman, is one possible candidate to move up to become chairman, and run the RNC, but the likelier choice is Hicks’s good friend Donald Trump Jr. The Trumpers will make the argument that NeverTrumpers cost them the election and are thus responsible for everything bad that might happen in a Biden administration, from crime on the streets to liberal Supreme Court picks to some future Benghazi-type episode. Something unpleasant might come of this. It tends to happen whenever a large mass of conformists convince themselves that they’ve been betrayed by a nonconforming minority in their midst. Then there’s the third scenario: An overwhelming and humiliating Trump defeat, on the order of George H.W. Bush’s 370-168 electoral vote loss to Bill Clinton in 1992. The infighting will begin the moment Florida, North Carolina or any other must-win state for Trump is called for Joe Biden. It will pit two main camps against each other. On the right, it will be the What Were We Thinking? side of the party. On the further right, the Trump Didn’t Go Far Enough side. Think of it as a cage match between Marco Rubio and Tucker Carlson for the soul of the GOP. Both sides will recognize that Trump was a uniquely incompetent executive who — as in his business dealings — always proved his own worst enemy, always squandered his luck, never learned from his mistakes, never grew in office. Both sides will want to wash their hands of the soon-to-beformer president, his obnoxious relatives, their intellectual vacuity and their self-dealing ways. And both will have to tread carefully around a wounded and bitter man who, like

a minefield laid for some long-ago war, still has the power to kill anyone who missteps. That’s where agreement ends. The What Were We Thinking? Republicans will want to hurry the party back to some version of what it was when Paul Ryan was its star. They’ll want to pretend that Trump never happened. They will organize a task force composed of former party worthies to write an election post-mortem, akin to what thenGOP chair Reince Priebus did after 2012, emphasizing the need to repair relations with minorities, women and younger voters. They’ll talk up the virtues of Republicans as reformers and problem-solvers, not Know-Nothings and culture warriors. The Didn’t Go Far Enough camp will make the opposite case. They’ll note that Trump never built the wall, never got U.S. troops out of the Middle East, never drained the swamp of Beltway corruption, ended NAFTA in name only, did Wall Street’s bidding at Main Street’s expense, and “owned the libs” on Twitter while losing the broader battle of ideas. This camp will seek a new champion: Trump plus a brain. These are two deeply unattractive versions of the party of Lincoln, one feckless, the other fanatical. Even so, all who care about the health of U.S. democracy should hold their noses and hope the feckless side prevails. As with the Democrats after Jimmy Carter’s defeat in 1980, it will probably take more than one electoral shellacking for conservative-leaning voters to appreciate the scale of disaster that Trump’s presidency inflicted on the party and the country. It will probably also take more than one defeat for the party to learn that electoral contests should still be waged, and won, near the center of the ideological spectrum, not the fringe. But everything has to start somewhere. A decisive Trump loss in November isn’t a sufficient condition for the GOP to begin to heal itself. It’s still a beginning.

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 29, 2020

Alcalde de Guaynabo inspecciona bombas para prevención de inundaciones Por THE STAR

l alcalde de Guaynabo, Ángel Pérez Otero inspeccionó junto a personal de Manejo de Emergencias municipal y el Departamento de Recursos Naturales, el funcionamiento de las bombas de Amelia y Sabana como parte de los preparativos ante el aviso de tormenta tropical emitido por el Servicio Nacional de Meteorología. “Sectores de las comunidades de Amelia y Sabana están en zona inundable. Ante el aviso de tormenta para Puerto Rico, quiero asegurarme que las bombas estén en funcionamiento y los generadores estén operando corectamente en caso de que se vaya la luz”, dijo el alcalde. Pérez Otero explicó que “estas comunidades están en zona inundable y dependen de que las bombas estén operando para evitar que sus casas se inunden con las lluvias que se espera que ocurran en las próximas horas”. El primer ejecutivo municipal indicó “que ayer en la tarde me reuní con representantes de las

agencias estatales para coordinar los refugios que tendremos disponibles para las personas que viven en áreas propensas a inundaciones o en riesgo de desprendimientos de terreno”. “Durante las pasadas semanas, Manejo de Emergencias y Obras Públicas municipal han realizado labores de mitigación de inundaciones con la limpieza de quebradas y el alcantarillado”, aseguró sobre los esfuerzos para mitigar daños por las lluvias en la temporada de huracanes. Pérez Otero hizo un llamado a los residentes de Guaynabo a prepararse y considerar la protección contra el Covid 19 en su plan de emergencia familiar. También solicitó la colaboración de los residentes a que no saquen escombros, para evitar que se conviertan en proyectiles y causen daños por los vientos que los expertos en meteorología han anticipado que se puedan sentir en nuestra zona. Para reportar emergencias llame al 9-1-1 o a nuestra Oficina Municipal de Manejo de Emergencias y Administración de Desastres al 787-

720-2320 “Es momento de repasar nuestra preparación y mantener la calma. Vamos a prepararnos para que nuestras familias y propiedades estén seguras”, concluyó.

Guardia Costera establece Condición Portuaria X-RAY en puertos marítimos de PR e Islas Vírgenes de EE.UU. Por THE STAR

a Guardia Costera estableció la Condición Portuaria X-RAY a las 2 de la tarde del martes para los puertos marítimos en Puerto Rico y las Islas Vírgenes de los Estados Unidos, ante un aviso de tormenta tropical para las islas y la posibilidad de que vientos sostenidos, mayores de 39 millas por hora (mph), pueden llegar dentro de 48 horas. La Guardia Costera apercibe a la comunidad marítima a que permanezca alerta a los pronósticos del tiempo para el Ciclón Potencial Núm. 9 y tome las precauciones necesarias, ya que este sistema atmosférico tiene la posibilidad de fortalecerse y desarrollarse en una tormenta tropical próximamente. Durante la Condición Portuaria X-RAY, las instalaciones marítimo portuarias permanecen abiertas a todo el tráfico marítimo comercial y todas las operaciones de carga en las facilidades portuarias pueden continuar mientras X-RAY permanezca en efecto. Se recuerda a los navegantes que no hay resguardo seguro en estas facilidades portuarias y que los puertos son más seguros cuando el inventario de embarcaciones es mínimo. Todos los buques comerciales oceánicos que superen las 500 toneladas brutas deben hacer planes para salir del puerto, los buques que deseen permanecer en el puerto deben presentar una solicitud al Capitán del Puerto antes de que se establezca y entre en efecto la Condición Portuaria

YANKEE. Los operadores de embarcaciones que deseen permanecer en el puerto deben comunicarse inmediatamente con el Capitán del Puerto para recibir permiso y presentar por escrito un plan de amarre para la embarcación. Se recomienda a las embarcaciones con destino a las Islas Vírgenes de Estados Unidos o a Puerto Rico a que busquen un destino alterno en el caso de que no puedan zarpar y salir del puerto 24 horas antes de la llegada de vientos de la tormenta. Se apercibe a los dueños de embarcaciones recreacionales a que busquen un puerto seguro para su embarcación. Se recuerda a las instalaciones marítimo portuarias que revisen y actualicen sus planes de respuesta y hagan los preparativos necesarios para enfrentar las condiciones climáticas adversas. En este momento, el Capitán del Puerto de San Juan anticipa establecer la Condición Portuaria YANKEE a las 8 de la noche del martes para los puertos marítimos en la Islas Vírgenes de Estados Unidos y en Puerto Rico. Este itinerario está sujeto a cambios según los pronósticos futuros del tiempo. En el caso de que se establezca la Condición Portuaria YANKEE, lo que significa que se esperan vientos con fuerza de tormenta tropical dentro de 24 horas, se restringirá el movimiento de embarcaciones y todo movimiento deberá ser aprobado por el Capitán del Puerto de San Juan de la Guardia Costera.

La Guardia Costera informa al público sobre estos importantes mensajes de seguridad: Asegure las pertenencias: Se insta a los dueños de grandes embarcaciones a que trasladen sus embarcaciones a marinas interiores donde serán menos vulnerables a liberarse de sus amarres o sufrir daños. Los botes de remolque deben sacarse del agua y almacenarse en un lugar no propenso a inundaciones. Se les recuerda a los que dejan sus embarcaciones en el agua a que remuevan los EPIRB y que aseguren los aros y chalecos salvavidas, al igual que los botes pequeños. Estos equipos, si no se aseguran adecuadamente, pueden liberarse y ocasionar que se desvíen recursos valiosos de búsqueda y rescate que deben estar disponibles para salvaguardar la vida de las personas que puedan estar en peligro. Manténgase alejado de las playas: Las alturas de las olas y las corrientes generalmente aumentan antes de que una tormenta llegue a tierra. Incluso los mejores nadadores pueden ser víctimas de las fuertes olas y las corrientes de resaca causadas por las tormentas. Las personas deben mantenerse alejados de las playas hasta que las autoridades locales digan que es seguro. Estar preparado: La ciudadanía deben estar preparada con un plan familiar, creando un kit de suministros para desastres, teniendo un lugar seguro para pasar la tormenta, asegurando su hogar y teniendo un plan para sus mascotas. Se puede encontrar información sobre este tema en la página web del Centro Nacional de Huracanes:

Wednesday, July 29, 2020

The San Juan Daily Star

Dave Franco realizes his worst vacation fears in ‘The Rental’ By ERIK PIEPEBURG

eople who offer their dwellings on Airbnb recently received a marketing email from the company about trends. As travel restrictions ease, the message said, groups and families will want “stays outside of major cities” where they can rent “entire homes and apartments.” For Dave Franco, those aren’t trends. They’re the makings of a nightmare. “I’ve become a little distrusting of strangers,” said Franco, 35, best known for his roles in movie comedies like “21 Jump Street” (2012) and “Neighbors” (2014). “Home sharing is one of these concepts where, if you take a step back, we’re really putting a lot of trust in strangers.” Franco explores his misgivings to eerie effect in “The Rental,” his feature directing debut (available on demand) about two couples whose getaway at a rented oceanside home turns into a cat-andmouse game with a mysterious adversary. Written by Franco and Joe Swanberg, the film puts a sharing-economy spin on the horror subgenre of wicked proprietors who, like Norman Bates, rent rooms with evil intent. The movie also touches on an insidious part of the home-sharing experience: racial discrimination. One of the weekend guests, Mina (Sheila Vand), is an Iranian American woman who suspects the home’s caretaker of bigoted motives after he ignores her booking request and instead rents the home to her white co-worker, Charlie, played by Dan Stevens. (The film also stars Jeremy Allen White and Alison Brie, Franco’s wife.) In a phone interview, Franco discussed this and other themes, but he pivoted from talking about his brother, artistic polymath James Franco, who directed him in the 2017 comedy “The Disaster Artist.” (“I draw inspiration from many directors I’ve worked with,” he said when asked about his brother’s influence.) Instead, Franco focused on why sharing is scary. Following are edited excerpts from the conversation. Q: There’s a long history of horror movies set inside residences. But yours is about a rental property. Why did that distinction interest you? A: I was inspired by my own paranoia about the concept of home sharing. The country is as divided as it’s ever been, but we trust staying in the home of a stranger because of positive reviews? We’re all aware of the risks of staying in a person’s home, and we don’t think anything will happen. My paranoia has reached its peak. Now when I stay in a rental home I don’t think, is there a camera in

“I have so much compassion for actors,” Dave Franco said about his approach as a director. this house? I think, will I find the cameras in this home? Q: Do you feel the same way when you stay in a hotel? A: I don’t think of this as much when it comes to a hotel. But I’ve read articles about a hotel where someone stayed in a room, planted a camera, started livestreaming the guests for months and posted it to porn sites. It’s not my intention to freak the world out. It’s more this idea of trusting a stranger. Q: Do you consider “The Rental” a horror film? A: It’s between a thriller, horror and relationship drama. I wanted to write the script with Joe Swanberg because his main strength lies in character and relationships. Our goal was to create a drama where the interpersonal issues are just as thrilling as the fact that there is a psycho villain in the shadows. We used the horror elements to accentuate the couples’ problems. Q: Why a horror movie as your feature debut? A: Most people know me from the comedies I’ve acted in, so it’s a surprise to them that I would want to tackle this genre. As a viewer, there’s nothing I enjoy more than a smart genre film that takes

the scare seriously. There were also logistical reasons I wanted my first time to be a thriller: I could make it relatively cheap with a small cast in one location. Within those parameters, I could have fun with the style. Mainly I just wanted to make a scary movie that was relatable and set in the real world. For me there’s nothing scarier than thinking: that could happen to me. Q: Are there horror films that influenced you? A: I just rewatched “The Blair Witch Project” and it holds up. It’s crazy that the movie is considered one of the scariest movies of all time and you don’t see the villain. I was also inspired by “Martha Marcy May Marlene,” “Blue Ruin” and “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre,” which all are grounded in the real world, where you believe something scary could happen, and the punches land hard. Q: Have you had any bad home-sharing experiences? A: With anything I write there are personal elements sprinkled throughout. But the racism that Mina experiences is not something that happened to me. It’s based on friends of mine who have experienced racial profiling while trying to rent on a home-sharing app. It’s so important to include that element in the movie. It was an honest way to create immediate tension between a renter, who in this case is of Iranian descent, and the white homeowner. When it comes to my friends, there were multiple situations where they tried to rent places that had availability but they were not allowed to rent. Q: What did you learn about being a director? A: Over the years I’ve realized that film is a director’s medium, and as an actor there’s only so much you can do. It’s disheartening when you put so much effort into a role and the editing or visuals or music can turn the performance into something you never thought it would be. As a director, the movie lives and dies on your decisions. That’s liberating. I have so much compassion for actors. When it came time to edit their performances, I would comb through the footage to ensure we used everyone’s best moment. I didn’t want the actors to think: Why would they use that take? Q: Now I’m going to think twice before renting a home share. Does this mean you’ve sworn off Airbnb? A: I still use Airbnb. [Laughs] I stayed in one while making this movie, in this wood cabin on the beach in Oregon. We brought Harry, our 17-yearold cat, with us and it was his first time ever getting on a plane. He was able to look out the windows every day. Harry was thriving. But he recently passed away. It was his last hurrah.

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 29, 2020

As a teenager, I hated Johnny Carson. Then came the pandemic. By JASON ZINOMAN

n the last few months, at the end of news-packed days, as the noise of my cooped-up children gives way to the calmer sounds of sirens and fireworks, I have found myself uninterested in seeing any of the current late-night hosts transform the horrors of the world into jokes. I get my fill on Twitter. Since the pandemic put normal life on pause, the only talk show I have regularly watched is, oddly enough, “The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson,” which airs weeknights on Antenna. This isn’t because I am seeking escape in the pleasures of my childhood — although I have done that, revisiting “Heathers” and A Tribe Called Quest as if they were old friends. But Johnny Carson holds no nostalgic appeal. When I was a teenager in the late ’80s and early ’90s, he represented the bland center of the mainstream, a toothless holdover from a Vegas-infused era of show business. What could be less cool than pantomiming a golf swing? I returned to his show first out of professional curiosity. Despite being the most visible and powerful comedian in America for three decades, building the talk show into a juggernaut on NBC before ending his run in 1992, Carson has mostly vanished from the public consciousness, discussed more as a gatekeeper than as a performer. But once I started bingeing old episodes of “The Tonight Show,” I found something oddly calming about his topical jokes about Watergate, Iran-Contra and other grave events that no longer seem urgent. Comedy plus time equals a certain indifference. But it wasn’t only that: Carson hosted with an unusually light touch and an equanimity that stands out in today’s hyperventilating culture. His monologue jokes are OK, steadily mediocre if sometimes corny constructions with amusing word choices (“topless kazoo player riding a yak”) but never as funny as the way he self-deprecatingly recovers from ones that bombed. He lingers on those, holding a pause or leaning forward ever so slightly, goosing the audience for more laughs at his expense. David Letterman admired this about Johnny Carson, and you can see the influence. But whereas Letterman brooded over his flops,

Carson never seemed angry for more than a moment, or for that matter, particularly thrilled. The guests ran hot and cold, but he never budged from room temperature. There is something even eerily alien about his temperament, as if he was observing humanity from a distance. Critic Kenneth Tynan once described Carson as “an immaculate machine.” Whenever Carson did get remotely flustered, he would always find his bearings by focusing his boyish glare at the audience at home. The intimacy on this show was in the relationship between Carson and the camera, and he could look at it like they shared a secret. To be sure, Carson’s studied neutrality contained darker undercurrents — most importantly, the old boys’ club sexism that shows up in the tediously leering asides that female guests like Bo Derek and Elke Sommer are subjected to and even in the monologue. In 1984, on the day that Walter Mondale picked Geraldine Ferraro as his vice presidential candidate, the first time a female politician had been chosen in that role by a major U.S. political party, Carson asked his audience how many thought it was a good idea to have a woman on the ticket. Loud applause. Then he asked how many thought it was a bad idea. About the same. Then came the punchline: “How many think we should move ahead slowly and start with Boy George?” The premise plays like a parody of the pernicious lies of both-siderism. While Carson hardly changed over the years, one thing I learned from watching episodes over several decades is that his show definitely did. When I watched Carson’s final years, his interviews always seemed like the product of much rehearsal, mapped out and focused on the promotional business at hand. But when Carson took over from Jack Paar in the 1960s, “The Tonight Show” was an hour and 45 minutes, and for much of the 1970s, it was 90 minutes before settling into an hour. In the early days, with that much time to fill, you can’t plot out every moment, and the show was by necessity looser. In the 1970s (when the desk sat on a shag rug), his conversations with guests were freewheeling, with him frequently pausing to smoke a cigarette. He was more willing to talk at length with Truman Capote about capital

A photo illustration of Johnny Carson. “As a teenager, I thought his ‘Tonight Show’ was a bland, uncool relic,” writes New York Times critic Jason Zinoman, of Johnny Carson. punishment or suddenly decide to ask every guest on an episode what they recall about their sixth-grade teacher. A master of small talk, Carson listened intently, interjecting strategically, livening up an interview by drawing on a seemingly limitless store of canned jokes and even occasionally poems. When actor Orson Bean told a story about someone who cut off an arm, Carson said that reminded him of an old joke about a guy with one finger: “He was a great pickpocket: He only stole key rings.” But the main reason that Johnny Carson’s “Tonight Show” is so fascinating today is its guests. Since there was so much less competition back then, he always got the biggest stars in America. On a given episode, you could see Jim Henson, Mel Blanc and Jack Benny together, so you get to hear the original voices of Kermit the Frog and Bugs Bunny on the same couch, in dialogue with the greatest radio comedian ever. Just as newspaper archives provide a first draft of history, Carson’s show provides an evolving portrait of the heights of fame and talent of the moment — in Hollywood but also the comedy clubs. Seeing Rodney Dangerfield or Steve Martin on the show was guaranteed to be a treat, but there’s also a number of forgot-

ten comics such as Ronnie Shakes who are reminders that the funniest people alive do not always make it big. Long before James Corden brought multiple guests at the same time onto U.S. talk shows, Carson created fascinating moments of interaction, like the time Roger Ebert panned “¡Three Amigos!” sitting next to Chevy Chase, who had just finished promoting it. Carson played the straight man effortlessly, looking just uncomfortable enough to appear polite. Toward the end of his run, “Saturday Night Live” bitingly satirized Carson in a sketch where Dana Carvey played a version of him trying to stay current by rebranding himself to mimic Arsenio Hall. Struggling to catch up to the times, he called himself Carsenio. In his book “The Late Shift,” Bill Carter reported that Carson was furious at NBC for airing that sketch. And even as a kid, I recall thinking it was merciless. But today I see it a little differently. One reason the joke is funny is that it’s absurd that Carson would try so hard to reinvent himself. Carson’s success was built on an inhuman consistency. That sounds boring, and perhaps it is. But it’s harder than it looks to pull off, and in stressful times, it can provide soothing comfort to numb yourself before bed.

FASHION The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, March July 4, 2020 Wednesday, 29, 2020 20 22

Angels and Artisans

The TheSan SanJuan JuanDaily DailyStar Star

silver sequins on plinths and pedestals and hanging circus apparatuses, suspending them in space like angelic astronauts. The dresses — in tulle, chiffon, organza and taffeta; ruffled, feathered, fecund with blooms — had been dramatically elongated (some were around 12 feet long), their proportions shifted to create a sense of lift and pull the eye upward. In them, the women looked like warrior angels, the phoenix rising from the ashes, fashion reborn. Before the set was unveiled, there was a short video from photographer and filmmaker Nick Knight featuring the dresses overlaid with images of fire and flowers, as if to emphasize their nature as a blank canvas onto which we project our own fantasies of self. But it was the dresses emerging from the darkness like a promise for the future that lingered. If Piccioli was looking to the heavens, however, Maria Grazia Chiuri of Dior was firmly planted on the earth. Indeed, she seemed to have lit the entire central square of Lecce with every little bulb in Italy, courtesy of artist Marinella Senatore, transforming the piazza in front of the Duomo into a multicolor fantasia fit for an MGM musical, complete with theme songs spelled out in lights: “We rise by lifting others”; “Be a builder of unguilt.” Under a pergola in the middle played assorted musicians from the Orchestra Roma Sinfonietta as well as the local Orchestra Popolare (mostly masked); around it danced a troupe of local dancers (all unmasked); and amid them came the models, streaming forth in an ode to the haute homespun. They wore apron dresses and playsuits and workmen’s jackets in raw jute striped like mattress ticking and A model on the runway at the Dior Cruise 2021 show in Lecce, Italy on July 22, 2020. Lots of ambition at blanket-fringed at the hem; diaphanous gowns caught at Valentino and Dior, the last of the pandemic-designed digital shows. the waist by natural leather corsets laced up the center; and crafty croBy VANESSA FRIEDMAN Which is to say: They may have cheted coats trimmed in curly sheepbeen all dressed up, but they were skin. They wore bright green silk ou know something is wonky in the state of Den- also naked statements of intent. pants printed with fields of wildflowmark when a designer tells you he wanted to do Both events were “live” — ers, and wisps of chiffon bristling something radical for a show so he decided to fo- which is to say, they involved actual with lace versions of the same, made cus on ... dresses. Dresses? models, and were filmed in front of in a local style called Tombolo. They Well, and people. “Just dresses, creativity and hu- a (tiny and mostly local) audience wore kerchiefs and flat shoes. mans.” — unlike many of the preceding Ever since Chiuri arrived at If that’s a radical act in fashion, then I’m William S. collections conceived during lockDior, she has used her cruise shows Yet Pierpaolo Piccioli, creative director of Valentino, down, which had homed in on the to shine a light on artisanship speaking after the debut of his couture video, which was digital idea and were more like muaround the world, collaborating filmed at Cinecittà Studios in Rome and then released to sic videos or trailers for collections with local collectives to highlight to be seen later. That gave the Valthe world, was entirely sincere. their work in her collections. It’s Along with the Busby-Berkeley-in-Puglia Dior entino and Dior shows an edge of an admirable idea, now more than cruise collection — which was held in a largely empty unease that felt oddly right for the ever, as so many independent busisquare in Lecce and posed the pointed question “Why moment (it was hard to focus entirenesses are challenged. This show don’t we appreciate craft like we appreciate couture?” ly on the clothes when a small part was fully in line with that imperative — his words brought to an end the first mixed-up show of your mind was wondering who (Chiuri has family roots in Puglia). was wearing a mask and assessing season as remade by the coronavirus. But the effect in the end was sort of It’s been a weird one, and these final two experienc- whether the models were social dis- A model on the runway at the Dior feudal and heavy-handed: Dior and es were no exception. Both were, in their own way, high- tancing). Then they diverged. Cruise 2021 show in Lecce, Italy on its dependents. ly personal. Both crystallized the values of each brand; In the cavernous depths of an July 22, 2020. Lots of ambition at In case anyone was wondering their ambitions and what space they want to occupy not unlit soundstage, Piccioli set 16 Valentino and Dior, the last of the who intended to make it out of this just in the fashion world but in the public imagination. models in pristine white gowns and pandemic-designed digital shows. particular period on top.

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 29, 2020

With eating disorders, looks can be deceiving By JANE E. BRODY

ppearances, as I’m sure you know, can be deceiving. In one all-too-common example, adolescents and young adults with disordered eating habits or outright eating disorders often go unrecognized by both parents and physicians because their appearance defies common beliefs: They don’t look like they have an eating problem. One such belief is that people with anorexia always look scrawny and malnourished when in fact they may be of normal weight or even overweight, according to recent research at the University of California, San Francisco. The researchers, led by Dr. Jason M. Nagata, a specialist in adolescent medicine at the university’s Benioff Children’s Hospital, found in a national survey that distorted eating behaviors occur in young people irrespective of their weight, gender, race, ethnicity or sexual orientation. And it’s not just about losing weight. The survey revealed that among young adults ages 18 to 24, 22% of males and 5% of females were striving to gain weight or build muscle by relying on eating habits that may appear to be healthy but that the researchers categorized as risky. These practices include overconsuming protein and avoiding fats and carbohydrates. The use of poorly tested dietary supplements and anabolic steroids was also common among those surveyed. The COVID-19 pandemic has likely exacerbated the problem for many teenagers whose daily routines have been disrupted and who now find themselves at home all day with lots of food being hoarded in kitchens and pantries, Nagata said in an interview. “We’re seeing more patients and referrals for eating disorders and their complications,” he said. Without a proper diagnosis and intervention, young people with distorted eating behaviors can jeopardize their growth and long-term health and may even create a substance abuse problem. The findings suggest that abnormal behavior with regard to food and exercise is often overlooked, misunderstood, ignored or perhaps viewed as a passing phase of adolescence. This is especially true among teenage boys. One-third of the high school boys surveyed said they were trying to gain weight and bulk up, and many were using risky methods to achieve their goals, Nagata told me. Sixty percent of the girls surveyed said they were trying to lose weight. Some consumed unbalanced diets that can jeopardize their growth and long-term health; others resorted to induced vomiting or abused laxatives, diuretics, diet pills or engaged in other hazardous behaviors like fasting or excessive exercise. Overall, distorted eating was more than twice as common among females than males. It was also reported more often among those who described themselves as Asian/Pacific Islanders, gay, lesbian or bisexual. Although diagnosis of an eating disorder like anorexia

Distorted eating behaviors occur in young people irrespective of their weight, gender, race, ethnicity or sexual orientation. or bulimia was twice as common among the young adults whose weight was normal or underweight, the fact that these disorders also exist in heavier young adults is often overlooked, Nagata said. “Almost half of those with anorexia nervosa are at or above normal weight,” he said. “Young people with atypical anorexia have the same body image distortions and severe psychological distress as those with regular anorexia. They’re at high medical risk and just as likely to be hospitalized for complications caused by their distorted eating behaviors.” Nagata’s colleague and co-author of the study, Dr. Kirsten Bibbins-Domingo, an internist at the university, said in an interview, “Physicians who care for young adults should think about patterns of eating that are harmful, and not just among very thin women. Young adults with abnormal eating habits too often fall between the cracks because physicians think of them as healthy. However, abnormal eating patterns are not uncommon in adolescence and young adulthood, and that’s when patterns of behavior related to later health and disease are established and solidified.” The problem of disordered eating behaviors among teens and young adults is often encouraged or compounded by participation in certain competitive sports and other activities that overemphasize a particular body weight and

physique. Among these are gymnastics, wrestling, dance, figure skating, weight lifting and bodybuilding. Social media, with its heavy focus on appearance, has fostered the problem as well, Nagata said. Even toys, like Barbie dolls and action figures, have made a contribution. “A study of male action figures found that they have become bigger, more muscular and more extreme in their appearance over a 30-year period,” he said. Bibbins-Domingo wants doctors to be proactive in asking about eating and exercise habits when treating adolescents and young adults. “They should have a conversation about what these young people are eating, when they’re eating and how they’re eating, and be able to give advice about healthy eating patterns. “Without making a value judgment about body size, they can open the door to a discussion about eating and exercise habits,” Bibbins-Domingo suggested. “The physician might ask, ‘What did you eat yesterday, and where, and what do you think about the choices you made?’ or ‘Do you want to address weight issues?’” The pandemic may offer one silver lining, Nagata said. “With more families eating meals together, it’s easier for parents to monitor what their kids are eating.” Having family meals together is one of the basic tenets of therapy for eating disorders, he said.

24 Casos (SUMAC), el cual puede acceder utilizando la Siguiente ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE dirección electrónica: https://uniPUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL GE- red.ramajudicial.pr, salvo que se NERAL DE JUSTICIA TRIBUNAL represente por derecho propio. El DE PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA abogado de la parte demandante es: Lcdo. Raül Rivera Burgos, SUPERIOR DE TOA BAJA. RAFAEL ANTONIO RIOS RUA 8879, Estancias de San Fernando, Calle 4, Número 4, A-35, GARCIA y LYMARIS Carolina, P.R. 00985, Tel. (787) RIVERA MARRERO 238-7665, Email: raulrblaw@ Demandante V. gmail.com. EXPEDIDO bajo mi FIRST BANK, BANCO firma y sello de este Tribunal de POPULAR SUCESORES Toa Baja, Puerto Rico, hoy día 21 de julio de 2020. LCDA. LAURA EN INTERES DE I. SANTA SANCHEZ, Secretaria DORAL FINANCIAL L. Lopez Rivera, Sec CORPORATION, H/N/C Regional. Tribunal Conf. I.

LEGAL NOTICE

H.F. MORTGAGE., JOHN DOE Y RICHARD ROE

DemandadoS CASO NIIJM. TB2020CV00278. SOBRE: CANCELACION DR PAGARE EXTRAVIADO. EDICTO. ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMERICA EL PRESIDENTE DE LOS ESTADOS UNIDOS EL ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO.

A: JOHN DOE V RICHARD ROE o sea, las personas ignoradas que puedan ser tenedores del pagaré extraviado.

Por la presente se les notifica que se ha presentada ante este tribunal una Demanda, en el caso de epígrafe, en la cual se solicita la cancelación de un pagaré a favor de Doral Financial Corporation h/n/c/ H.F. Mortgage Bankers, o a su orden, por la suma de $169,000.00, intereses al 9.95% anual, vencedera el 1 de marzo de 2020; escritura número 132, otorgada en San Juan el 17 de febrero de 2005 , testimonio 1415, ante el notario Juan Manuel Casanova Rivera; e inscrito al folio I del tomo 646 de Toa baja, finca 28293, inscripción cuarta, y que grava Ia propiedad que se describe a continuación: RUSTICA: Parcela de terreno radicada en el Barrio Candelaria de Toa Baja, Puerto Rico, con una cabida de 1,959.88 metros cuadrados, en lindes por el Norte, en 38.21 metros, con camino municipal; por el Sur, en 38 metros, colindando con terrenos propiedad del señor Clark; Este, en 48.27 metros, colindando con el señor Emilio Martinez; y por el Oeste, en 58.33 metros, colindando con el señor Emilio Martinez. Se le advierte que este edicto se publicara en un periódico de circulación general una sola vez y que si no comparece a contestar dicha Demanda dentro del término de treinta (30) días, contados a partir de Ia publicación de este edicto, el tribunal podrá dictar sentencia en rebeldía en su contra y conceder el remedio solicitado en Ia demanda o cualquier otro, si el tribunal, en el ejercicio de su discreción, lo entiende procedente. Usted deberá presentar su alegación responsiva a través del Sistema Unificado de Manejo y Administración de

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

ORIENTAL BANK Demandante V.

JOSÉ ALBERTO ROQUE TORRES; JOHN DOE Y RICHARD ROE

Demandados CIVIL NÚM. GB2020CV00423. SOBRE: SUSTITUCIÓN DE PAGARÉ HIPOTECARIO. EMPLAZAMIENTO. ESTADOS UNIDOS DE AMERICA 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 un pagaré hipotecario otorgado el 24 de octubre de 2005, José Alberto Roque Torres otorgó en San Juan, Puerto Rico un pagaré hipotecario por la suma principal de $212,400.00, con intereses a razón del 5 7/8% anual, a favor de la Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria Puerto Rico (hoy Oriental Bank), o a su orden, con vencimiento el I de noviembre de 2035, ante el Notario Raúl J. Vilá Sellés, mediante el afidávit número 35956, se extravió, sin embargo la deuda evidenciada y garantizada por dicho pagaré 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 24 de octubre de 2005, José Alberto Roque Torres constituyó hipoteca número 738 ante el Notario Raúl J. Vilá Sellés en garantía del pago del pagaré antes descrito, inscrita al folio #163 del tomo #1433 de Guaynabo, finca #47305, inscripción

2da, Registro de la Propiedad de Guaynabo. La hipoteca que garantiza dicho pagaré grava la propiedad inmueble que se describe a continuación: URBANA: PROPIEDAD HORIZONTAL: Apartamento #I4-D. Apartamento residencial localizado en el primer piso de la Torre I del “Condominio Regency Park”, situado éste en el kilómetro 6.0, de la Carretera Estatal #20, en el Barrio Frailes, del municipio de Guaynabo, Puerto Rico. Este apartamento tiene un área de 1,135 pies cuadrados, equivalentes a 106.48 metros cuadrados. Colinda por el NORTE, con el espacio abierto sobre el patio Norte del Condominio; por el SUR, con el apartamento 14-H y área común; por el ESTE; con el espacio abierto sobre el patio Este del Condominio; y por el OESTE, con el apartamento 14-B. La puerta principal de entrada de este apartamento está situada en su colindancia Oeste, la cual lo conecta con el pasillo del piso y este a su vez, con los elevadores y escaleras del edificio y mediante el uso de estos, se logra comunicar a los usuarios del apartamento con los demás pisos del edificio y con el nivel de acceso a estos. Consta de dos habitaciones, un closet en cada habitación, dos baños, cocina, sala-comedor, dos closets de servicio y terraza. Se asignan a este apartamento los espacios de estacionamiento numerados 79 y 121 localizados en el Edificio anexo para el Estacionamiento de vehículos de Motor de la Torre Residencial I, sujeto a redistribución según lo dispone la escritura matriz y el reglamento del Condominio. Este apartamento tiene una participación de 0.00290530993% en los elementos comunes generales del Condominio y de 0.00676% en los elementos comunes limitados de la Torre Residencial I. Finca 47305 inscrita al 163 del tomo 1433 de Guaynabo, Registro de la Propiedad de Guaynabo. POR LA PRESENTE se le emplaza para que presente al tribuna! 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 e! ejercicio de su sana discreción, lo entien-

staredictos@thesanjuandailystar.com

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

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 sin más citarle ni oírle, si el tribunal en el ejercicio de su sana discreción, o entiende procedente. El sistema SUMAC notificará copia al abogado de la parte demandante, el Lcdo. Kenmuel J. Ruiz López cuya dirección es: P.O. Box 71418 San Juan, Puerto Rico 00936-8518, teléfoLEGAL NOTICE no (787) 993-3731 a la dirección ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE y a la dirección n tificaciones@ PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE orf-law.com. EXTENDIDO BAJO PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA DE MI FIRMA y el sello del Tribunal, CAGUAS. en Caguas, , Puerto Rico, hoy MERCHANT día 21 de julio de 2020. En Caguas, Puerto Rico, el 21 de julio ADVANCE, LLC de 2020. - Carmen Ana Pereira DEMANDANTE VS. Ortiz, Secretaria, Teresita Vega MISION CELESTIAL Gonzalez, Secretaria Auxiliar. de 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 21 de julio de 2020. LAURA L SANTA SÁNCHEZ, Secretaria Regional. Diamar T Gonzalez Barreto, Secretaria del Tribunal Confidencial II.

DETECTIVE, INC. Y OSVALDO RODRIGUEZ DELGADO Y FULANA DE TAL, AMBOS EN SU CARÁCTER PERSONAL Y COMO MIEMBROS DE LA SOCIEDAD LEGAL DE BIENES GANANCIALES QUE ESTOS COMPONEN.

LEGAL NOTICE

POR LA PRESENTE se le emplaza y requiere para que conteste la demanda dentro de los treinta (30) días siguientes a la publicación de ste Edicto. Usted deberá presentar su alegación responsiva a través del Sistema Unificad de Manejo y Administración de Casos (SUMAC), la cual puede acceder utilizando la siguiente dirección electrónica:https://unired.ramaiudicial.pr, salvo que se represente por derecho propio,

(787) 743-3346

LEGAL NOTICE

Estado Libre Asociado de Puerto ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE Rico TRIBUNAL GENERAL DE PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE JUSTICIA Tribunal de Primera PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA SU- Instancia Sala de SAN JUAN. PERIOR DE BAYAMÓN. ORIENTAL BANK

AMERICAS LEADING FINANCE, LLC Demandante v.

JOEL FONTANEZ FERMAINTT, ROQUE SALAYET

DEMANDADO CIVIL NÚM.: CG2019CV04806. SOBRE: COBRO DE DINERO. Demandados EMPLAZAMIENTO POR EDICCIVIL NÚM.: BY2020CV01866 TO. A: MISION CELESTIAL (402). SOBRE: COBRO DE DINERO POR LA VÍA ORDINARIA DETECTIVES INC, Y EJECUCIÓN DE GRAVAMEN MEDIANTE OSVALDO MOBILIARIO (REPOSESIÓN DE RODRIGUEZ DELGADO VEHÍCULO). EMPLAZAMIENO PEDRO DE JESUS TO POR EDICTO. ESTADOS RODRIGUES O GENTE UNIDOS DE AMÉRICA EL PRESIDENTE DE LOS EE.UU. DE AUTORIZADO. EL ESTADO LIBRE A: OSVALDO RODRIGUEZ AMERICA ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO. DELGADO Y FULANA SS.

DE TAL POR SI Y COMO REPRESENTANTE DE LA SOCIEDAD LEGAL DE BIENES GANANCIALES COMPUESTA POR AMBOS. NOTIFIQUESE A LAS DIRECCIONES: ¯ Calle Modesto Solá#12 y 14 Caguas, PR. ¯ Villa Blanca Opalo V4, Caguas, P.R. 0725. ¯ PO Box 276, Caguas, P.R. 00726

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, se le anotará la rebeldía y se dictará Sentencia concediendo el remedio así solicitado sin más citarles ni oírles. La abogada de la parte demandante es la Lcdo. Gerardo M. Ortiz Torres, cuya dirección física y postal es: Cond. El Centro I, Suite 801, 500 Muñoz Rivera Ave., San Juan, Puerto Rico 00918; cuyo número de teléfono es (787) 946-5268, el facsímile (787) 946-0062 y su correo electrónico es: gerardo@ bellverlaw.com. Expedido bajo mi firma y sello de este Tribunal, en Bayamon, Puerto Rico, hoy día 22 de julio de 2020. Lcda. Laura I Santa Sanchez, Secretario Regional. Carmen M Pintado, Sec Auxiliar del Tribunal I.

A: Joel Fontánez Fermaintt y Roque Salayet

Quedan emplazados y notificados que en este Tribunal se ha radicado Demanda sobre cobro de dinero por la vía ordinaria en la que se alega que los demandados, Joel Fontánez Fermaintt y Roque Salayet, le adeudan solidariamente al Americas Leading Finance, LLC, la suma de principal de $24,572.00, más los intereses que continúen acumulando, las costas, gastos y honorarios de abogado según pactados. Además, solicitamos de este Honorable Tribunal que autorice la reposesión y/o embargo del Vehículo. Se les advierte que este edicto se publicará en un periódico de circulación general una sola vez y que, si no comparecen a contestar dicha Demanda dentro del término de treinta (30) días a partir de la publicación del Edicto, a través del Sistema Unificado de Manejo y Administración de Casos (SUMAC), al

Demandante v.

MARIA DE LOURDES RODRIGUEZ NUÑEZ; JOHN DOE Y RICHARD ROE; ASOCIACION DE EMPLEADOS DEL ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE PUERTO RICO

Demandado(a) Civil: SJ2020CV01400 (803). Sobre: SUSTITUCIÓN DE PAGARÉ HIPOTECARIO. NOTIFICACIÓN DE SENTENCIA POR EDICTO. NOTIFICACION DE SENTENCIA POR EDICTO.

A: JOHN DOE Y RICHARD ROE

de julio de 2020. En San Juan, CITIBANK, N.A. h/n/c Puerto Rico, el 23 de julio de Citimortgage, Inc. JOHN 2020. GRISELDA RODRIGUEZ DOE & RICHARD ROE COLLADO, Secretaria Regional. Demandado(a) MILDRED MARTINEZ ACOSTA, Civil: BY2019CV06730. SALA: Secretaria Auxiliar I. 502. Sobre: CANCELACION DE PAGARE EXTRAVIADO. NOLEGAL NOTICE TIFICACIÓN DE SENTENCIA Estado Libre Asociado de Puerto POR EDICTO. NOTIFICACION Rico TRIBUNAL GENERAL DE DE SENTENCIA POR EDICTO. JUSTICIA Tribunal de Primera A: JOHN DOE Y Instancia Sala Superior de HURICHARD ROE MACAO. (Nombre de las partes a las que se ORIENTAL BANK le notifican la sentencia por edicto) Demandante v. EL SECRETARIO(A) que suscriJOHN DOE & be le notifica a usted que el 23 RICHARD ROE de julio de 2020, este Tribunal Demandado(a) ha dictado Sentencia, SentenCivil: HU2020CV00024. Sobre: cia Parcial o Resolución en este CANCELACION DE PAGARE caso, que ha sido debidamente EXTRAVIADO. NOTIFICACIÓN registrada y archivada en autos DE SENTENCIA POR EDICTO. donde podrá usted enterarse deNOTIFICACION DE SENTENCIA talladamente de los términos de POR EDICTO. la misma. Esta notificación se A: JOHN DOE Y publicará una sola vez en un peRICHARD ROE personas riódico de circulación general en desconocidas que se la Isla de Puerto Rico, dentro de los 10 días siguientes a su notifidesignan con estos cación. Y, siendo o representado nombres ficticios, que usted una parte en el procedipuedan ser tenedor o miento sujeta a los términos de tenedores, o puedan tener la Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial algún interés en el pagaré o Resolución, de la cual puede hipotecario, P/C LCDO. establecerse recurso de revisión o apelación dentro del término JAVIER MONTALVO de 30 días contados a partir de CINTRON la publicación por edicto de esta (Nombre de las partes a las que se notificación, dirijo a usted esta le notifican la sentencia por edicto) notificación que se considerará EL SECRETARIO(A) que suscrihecha en la fecha de la publicabe le notifica a usted que el 21 ción de este edicto. Copia de de julio de 2020, este Tribunal esta notificación ha sido archivaha dictado Sentencia, Sentenda en los autos de este caso, el cia Parcial o Resolución en este 24 de julio de 2020. En BAYAcaso, que ha sido debidamente MON, Puerto Rico, el 24 de julio registrada y archivada en autos de 2020. LCDA LAURA I. SANTA donde podrá usted enterarse deSÁNCHEZ, Secretaria Regional. talladamente de los términos de VERONICA RIVERA RODRIla misma. Esta notificación se GUEZ, Secretaria Auxiliar. publicará una sola vez en un periódico de circulación general en LEGAL NOTICE la Isla de Puerto Rico, dentro de Estado Libre Asociado de Puerto los 10 días siguientes a su notifiRico TRIBUNAL GENERAL DE cación. Y, siendo o representado JUSTICIA Tribunal de Primera usted una parte en el procediInstancia Sala Superior de CAmiento sujeta a los términos de GUAS. la Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial DAISY MELENDEZ o Resolución, de la cual puede ARROYO t/c/c DAISY establecerse recurso de revisión o apelación dentro del término WITHLOCK, MELVIN de 30 días contados a partir de EARL WHITLOCK Y LA la publicación por edicto de esta SOCIEDAD LEGAL DE notificación, dirijo a usted esta BIENES GANANCIALES notificación que se considerará hecha en la fecha de la publica- POR ESTOS COMPUESTA Demandante v. ción de este edicto. Copia de BANCO POPULAR DE esta notificación ha sido archivada en los autos de este caso, el PUERTO RICO como 23 de julio de 2020. En HUMA- custodio de los archivos CAO, Puerto Rico, el 23 de julio de WESTERNBANK de 2020. DOMINGA GOMEZ PUERTO RICO, JOHN FUSTER, Secretaria Regional. F/ DOE Y RICHARD ROE EVELYN FELIX VAZQUEZ, SeDemandado(a) cretaria Auxiliar I. Civil: CG2020CV0261. Sobre: LEGAL NOTICE CANCELACION DE PAGARE Estado Libre Asociado de Puerto EXTRAVIADO. NOTIFICACIÓN Rico TRIBUNAL GENERAL DE DE SENTENCIA POR EDICTO. JUSTICIA Tribunal de Primera NOTIFICACION DE SENTENCIA Instancia Sala Superior de BA- POR EDICTO.

EL SECRETARIO(A) que suscribe le notifica a usted que el 21 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 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 60 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 YAMON. notificación ha sido archivada ORIENTAL BANK en los autos de este caso, el 23 Demandante v.

A: JOHN DOE Y RICHARD ROE

(Nombre de las partes a las que se

The San Juan Daily Star le notifican la sentencia por edicto) EL SECRETARIO(A) que suscribe le notifica a usted que el 22 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 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, el 24 de julio de 2020. En CAGUAS, Puerto Rico, el 24 de julio de 2020. CARMEN ANA PEREIRA ORTIZ, Secretaria Regional. F/YARITZA ROSARIO PLACERES, Secretaria Auxiliar.

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

ORIENTAL BANK Demandante v.

JOHN DOE Y RICHARD ROE

Demandado(a) Civil: GB2020CV00252. SALA: 201. Sobre: CANCELACION DE PAGARE EXTRAVIADO. NOTIFICACIÓN DE SENTENCIA POR EDICTO. NOTIFICACION DE SENTENCIA POR EDICTO.

A: JOHN DOE Y RICHARD ROE

(Nombre de las partes a las que se le notifican la sentencia por edicto) EL SECRETARIO(A) que suscribe le notifica a usted que el 21 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 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, el 24 de julio de 2020. En GUAY-

Wednesday, July 29, 2020

NABO, Puerto Rico, el 24 de julio A: ISRAEL de 2020. LCDA. LAURA I SANTA MARRERO JR SANCHEZ, Secretaria Regional (Nombre de las partes a las que se II. F/SARA ROSA VILLEGAS, le notifican la sentencia por edicto) Sec del Trib. Conf. I. EL SECRETARIO(A) que suscribe le notifica a usted que el 23 LEGAL NOTICE de ABRIL de 2020, este Tribunal Estado Libre Asociado de Puerto ha dictado Sentencia, Sentencia Rico TRIBUNAL GENERAL DE Parcial o Resolución en este JUSTICIA Tribunal de Primera caso, que ha sido debidamente Instancia Sala Superior de CA- registrada y archivada en autos ROLINA. donde podrá usted enterarse deAMERICAS LEADING talladamente de los términos de la misma. Esta notificación se FINANCE LLC publicará una sola vez en un peDemandante v. riódico de circulación general en ELBA ROSAURA la Isla de Puerto Rico, dentro de SEPULVEDA ORTIZ los 10 días siguientes a su notifiDemandado(a) cación. Y, siendo o representado Civil: CA2019CV02390. Sobre: usted una parte en el procediCOBRO DE DINERO POR LA miento sujeta a los términos de VIA ORDINARIA Y EJECUCION la Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial DE GRAVAMEN MOBILIARIO o Resolución, de la cual puede (REPOSISION DE VEHICULO). establecerse recurso de revisión NOTIFICACIÓN DE SENTENCIA o apelación dentro del término POR EDICTO. NOTIFICACION de 30 días contados a partir de la DE SENTENCIA POR EDICTO. publicación por edicto de esta noA: ELBA ROSAURA tificación, dirijo a usted esta noSEPULVEDA ORTIZ tificación que se considerará he(Nombre de las partes a las que se cha en la fecha de la publicación le notifican la sentencia por edicto) de este edicto. Copia de esta EL SECRETARIO(A) que suscri- notificación ha sido archivada be le notifica a usted que el 9 de en los autos de este caso, el 23 MARZO de 2020, este Tribunal de julio de 2020. En CAGUAS, ha dictado Sentencia, Senten- Puerto Rico, el 23 de julio de cia Parcial o Resolución en este 2020. CARMEN ANA PEREIRA caso, que ha sido debidamente ORTIZ, Secretaria Regional. Teregistrada y archivada en autos resita Vega Gonzalez, Secretaria donde podrá usted enterarse de- Auxiliara. talladamente de los términos de la misma. Esta notificación se LEGAL NOT ICE publicará una sola vez en un pe- Estado Libre Asociado de Puerto riódico de circulación general en Rico TRIBUNAL GENERAL DE la Isla de Puerto Rico, dentro de JUSTICIA Tribunal de Primera los 10 días siguientes a su notifi- Instancia Sala Superior de CAcación. Y, siendo o representado GUAS. usted una parte en el procediAMERICAS LEADING miento sujeta a los términos de FINANCE LLC la Sentencia, Sentencia Parcial Demandante v. 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, el 23 de julio de 2020. En CAROLINA, Puerto Rico, el 23 de julio de 2020. LCDA. MARILYN APONTE RODRÍGUEZ, Secretaria Regional. MARY D. CARRASQUILLO BETANCOURT, Sec del Trib. Conf. I.

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

AMERICAS LEADING FINANCE LLC Demandante v.

ISRAEL MARRERO JR

Demandado(a) Civil: CG2019CV02377. SALA: 704. Sobre: COBRO DE DINERO POR LA VÍA ORDINARIA Y EJECUCIÓN DE GRAVAMEN MOBILIARIO REPOSESIÓN DE VEHÍCULO. NOTIFICACIÓN DE SENTENCIA POR EDICTO. NOTIFICACION DE SENTENCIA POR EDICTO.

HECDALYN FIGUEROA ROQUE, SU ESPOSO FULANO DE TALY LA SOCIEDAD LEGAL DE GANANCIALES COMPUESTA POR AMBOS

Demandado(a) Civil: CG2018CV02736. Sobre: COBRO DE DINERO POR LA VÍA ORDINARIA Y EJECUCIÓN DE GRAVAMEN MOBILIARIO (REPOSESIÓN DE VEHÍCULO). NOTIFICACIÓN DE SENTENCIA POR EDICTO. NOTIFICACION DE SENTENCIA POR EDICTO.

A: HECDALYN FIGUEROA ROQUE, SU ESPOSO FULANO DE TAL Y LA SOCIEDAD LEGAL DE GANANCIALES COMPUESTA POR AMBOS

(Nombre de las partes a las que se le notifican la sentencia por edicto) EL SECRETARIO(A) que suscribe le notifica a usted que el 20 de marzo 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 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, el 23 de julio de 2020. En CAGUAS, Puerto Rico, el 23 de julio de 2020. CARMEN ANA PEREIRA ORTIZ, Secretaria Regional. f/GLORIMAR RIVERA RIVERA, Secretaria Auxiliara.

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

PR RECOVERY AND DEVELOPMENT JV, LLC Demandante v.

JUAN FÉLIX DÁVILA VALDÉS Y OTROS

Demandado(a) Civil: LO2019CV00181. Sobre: COBRO DE DINERO. NOTIFICACIÓN DE SENTENCIA POR EDICTO. NOTIFICACION DE SENTENCIA POR EDICTO.

A: JUAN FÉLIX DÁVILA VALDÉS, MICHELLE ORLANDI GUZMÁN Y LA SOCIEDAD LEGAL DE GANANCIALES COMPUESTA POR AMBOS

(Nombre de las partes a las que se le notifican la sentencia por edicto) EL SECRETARIO(A) que suscribe le notifica a usted que el 23 de marzo 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 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, el 24 de julio de 2020. En CAROLINA, Puerto Rico, el 24 de julio de 2020. MARILYN APONTE RODRIGUEZ, Secretaria Regional. f/ JANNETTE RAMÍREZ BERNARD, Secretaria Auxiliar.

PAGARE EXTRAVIADO. NOTI- usted esta notificación que se FICACIÓN DE SENTENCIA POR considerará hecha en la fecha Estado Libre Asociado de Puerto EDICTO. de la publicación de este edicRico TRIBUNAL GENERAL DE to. Copia de esta notificación ha A: JOHN DOE Y JUSTICIA Tribunal de Primera sido archivada en los autos de RICHARD ROE Instancia Sala Superior de Ca- (Nombre de las partes a las que se este caso, el 27 de julio de 2020. quas. le notifican la sentencia por edicto) En SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico, el 27 CONSEJO DE TITULARES EL SECRETARIO(A) que suscri- de julio de 2020. GRISELDA RObe le notifica a usted que el 24 DRÍGUEZ COLLADO, Secretaria DEL CONDOMINIO f/ DENISE M. AMARO ESTANCIAS DEL REY de julio de 2020, este Tribunal Regional. ha dictado Sentencia, Senten- MACHUCA, Secretaria Auxiliar. Demandante v. cia Parcial o Resolución en este CARLOS ANTONIO LEGAL NOTICE caso, que ha sido debidamente MATEO RODRIGUEZ; registrada y archivada en autos ESTADO LIBRE ASOCIADO DE REBECCA ESQUILIN donde podrá usted enterarse PUERTO RICO TRIBUNAL DE detalladamente de los términos PRIMERA INSTANCIA SALA DE DE MATEO Y LA de la misma. Esta notificación CAROLINA. SOCIEDAD LEGAL

LEGAL NOTICE

DE GANANCIALES COMPUESTAS POR AMBOS

Demandado(a) Civil: CG2019CV02872. Sobre: COBRO DE DINERO (PROCEDIMIENTO ORDINARIO). NOTIFICACIÓN DE SENTENCIA POR EDICTO.

A: CARLOS ANTONIO MATEO RODRIGUEZ, REBECCA ESQUILIN DE MATEO, POR SI Y EN REPRESENTACION DE LA SOCIEDAD LEGAL DE GANANCIALES COMPUESTA POR AMBOS

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

ORIENTAL BANK Demandante v.

JOHN DOE & RICHARD ROE

Demandado(a) Civil: BY2020CV01381. SALA: 703. Sobre: CANCELACION DE

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, el 24 de julio de 2020. En BAYAMON, Puerto Rico, el 24 de julio de 2020. LCDA. LAURA I. SANTA SANCHEZ, Secretaria Regional. F/ MARIA E. COLLAZO, Secretaria Auxiliar.

LEGAL NOTICE Estado Libre Asociado de Puerto Rico TRIBUNAL GENERAL DE JUSTICIA Tribunal de Primera Instancia Sala Superior de SAN JUAN.

ORIENTAL BANK Demandante v.

JOHN DOE Y RICHARD ROE

Demandado(a) Civil: SJ2020CV03178 (602). Sobre: CANCELACIÓN DE PAGARÉ EXTRAVIADO. NOTIFICACIÓN DE SENTENCIA POR EDICTO POR SUMAC.

A: JOHN DOE Y RICHARD ROE

(Nombre de las partes a las que se le notifican la sentencia por edicto) EL SECRETARIO(A) que suscribe le notifica a usted que el 27 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 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

MTGLQ INVESTORS, L.P. Parte Demandante Vs.

SUCESIÓN DE HÉCTOR FUENTES OSORIO compuesta por Héctor Fuentes Navarro, Iris Fuentes Navarro, Víctor Manuel Fuentes López, Lydia Osorio Fuentes; John Doe y Richard Roe como posibles herederos desconocidos de Héctor Fuentes Osorio y JUANA FUENTES LOPEZ por si y como viuda de Héctor Fuentes Osorio; ADMINISTRACIÓN PARA EL SUSTENTO DE MENORES, Y CENTRO DE RECAUDACIÓN SOBRE INGRESOS MUNICIPALES

Parte Demandada CASO CIVIL NUM: CA2019CV03098. SOBRE: EJECUCION DE HIPOTECA POR LA VIA ORDINARIA Y COBRO DE DINERO. EMPLAZAMIENTO Y NOTIFICACION DE INTERPELACION POR EDICTO. Estados Unidos de América Presidente de los Estados Unidos de América Estado Libre Asociado de Puerto Rico.

A: John Doe y Richard Roe como posibles herederos desconocidos de la Sucesión de Héctor Fuentes Osorio también conocido como Héctor Fuentes

POR LA PRESENTE se les emplaza y requiere para que conteste la demanda y que se exprese en torno a su aceptación o repudiación de la herencia de Héctor Fuentes Osorio también conocido como Héctor Fuentes, 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 Colón Villanueva, al PO BOX 7970, Ponce, P.R. 00732; Teléfono: 787-843-4168. 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 abril de 2016, 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 $75,466.88 de balance de principal, el cual se compone de un primer principal por la suma de $73,855.89 y un principal diferido por la suma de $1,610.99, más intereses sobre la suma de $73,855.89 a razón del 7.716% 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 la suma estipulada 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 número veinte (20) del bloque AD de la Urbanización Villas de Río Grande radicada en el Barrio Pueblo del Municipio de Río Grande, compuesto de trescientos uno punto treinta (301.30) metros cuadrados. Colindante por el Norte, en veintitrés punto cero cero (23.00) metros, con el solar número veintidós (22); por el SUR, en veintitrés punto cero cero (23.00) metros con el solar número dieciocho (18); por el ESTE, en trece punto diez (13.10) metros con el solar número diecinueve (19) del bloque V; por el OESTE, en trece punto diez (13.10) metros con la calle número veinticuatro (24). Enclava una casa. Inscrita al folio dieciocho ocho (18) del tomo ciento veintiséis (126) de Río Grande, finca número seis mil trescientos cuarenta (6,340). Registro de la Propiedad de Carolina Sección III. 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, además se presumirá que usted ha aceptado la herencia de Héctor Fuentes Osorio también conocido como Héctor Fuentes y por consiguiente, responden por las cargas de dicha herencia conforme dispone el Art. 957 del Código Civil, 31 L.P.R.A. S2785 el término de treinta (30) días antes señalado, Expedido bajo mi firma y sello del Tribunal en Carolina, Puerto Rico. A 24 de julio de 2019. Lcda. Marilyn Aponte Rodriguez, Secretaria Regional. Ruth M. Colon Luciano, Sec del Tribunal.

Wednesday, July 29, 2020

The San Juan Daily Star

Miami Marlins outbreak postpones 2 games and rocks MLB’s return By TYLER KEPNER

he return of Major League Baseball took a troubling turn earlier this week when a looming threat became reality: an outbreak of positive coronavirus tests within a team. While MLB officials said there were no plans to suspend or cancel the season — which began just last Thursday — two games were postponed Monday after the Miami Marlins learned that at least 14 members of the team’s traveling party, including 12 players, had tested positive for the virus. The Marlins’ games against the Baltimore Orioles on Monday and Tuesday were postponed, as was the New York Yankees’ game Monday in Philadelphia, where the Marlins spent the weekend. “The health of our players and staff has been and will continue to be our primary focus as we navigate through these uncharted waters,” Derek Jeter, the Marlins’ chief executive, said in a statement, adding that the team needed to “take a collective pause and try to properly grasp the totality of this situation.” For many Americans, the long-delayed return of baseball was a sign of normalcy during a pandemic that has shut down much of the nation and thrown daily activities into disarray. Even without fans in the stands, the league’s return had seemed like a triumph, or at least a comforting sight, after more than four months with a largely shuttered sports landscape. But the news about the Marlins was a stark reminder of the challenge facing a country trying to find a more normal routine. If baseball, a $10 billion industry operating in a controlled environment and employing frequent testing cannot prevent infections, then how are schools, restaurants and other retail businesses going to do so? “I think it’s another indictment of the United States’ overall approach to COVID,” said Dr. Michael Saag, an infectious diseases expert at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. He added: “We find ourselves impatient. And that’s what I think we’re suffering from, both in terms of not just Major League Baseball but for every other thing we’re trying to do.” The crisis baseball is confronting also raises concerns for other sports planning their return, particularly professional and college football, given the shifting geography of the outbreak. While many leagues preparing to start up again are doing so in contained environments, playing all their games in one or two locations, the National Football League is planning on holding games at its usual stadiums across the country, like baseball. The Marlins, for now, are staying in Philadelphia, Jeter said, while awaiting the results of another round of testing for players and staff. The Phillies were tested at their ballpark Monday while the Yankees stayed at their hotel, which the Marlins did not share. The Orioles, who were in Miami, made plans to return to Baltimore, where they are scheduled to host the Marlins today and Thursday.

Miami Marlins players after their first game of the season on Friday. The Marlins news heightened a sense of dread among players and coaches who opted to participate in this season. At least a dozen players opted out before the restarted season. “This thing really hits home now that you see half a team get infected and go from one city to another,” said Washington Nationals manager Dave Martínez. He added: “I’ll be honest with you, I’m scared, I really am.” The league is attempting to stage a 60-game regular season using 30 stadiums across the United States, including a Class AAA ballpark in Buffalo for the Toronto Blue Jays, who were barred from playing home games by the Canadian government because of the risk of travel to and from the United States. Baseball’s decision to play games at home sites stands apart from professional basketball and hockey, which are preparing to resume play in contained environments, rather than across the continent. The National Basketball Association, which will resume its season Thursday, is housing players and holding games at Walt Disney World near Orlando, Fla., while the National Hockey League is using sites in two cities when it restarts Saturday: Toronto and Edmonton Those leagues are also using fewer teams and planning fewer games than baseball is; both were deep into their seasons when sports shut down in mid-March, so hockey teams will move directly to the playoffs, with 24 of 31 teams taking part, while the NBA’s plan involves only 22 of its 30 teams for the end of its season. The professional football season is set to begin on Sept. 10, while decisions about fall college sports, including football, have been largely left to university presidents and conferences. While some conferences, including the Ivy League, have canceled fall sports and others have already pared down their schedules, most

major universities are expecting to move ahead with varsity sports. But even they have acknowledged the tenuous nature of those plans. “I’m personally concerned about schools reopening in hot spot states, and we know where they are,” Saag said. “I think Major League Baseball is kind of the vanguard on this, and the other collections of people — be it students or campuses or the NBA perhaps — it’s all going to follow suit because we’re in such a big hurry.” In an interview with The New York Times in May, Commissioner Rob Manfred outlined the challenges of planning baseball during the pandemic. “One of the things that floated up from one of the experts is, ‘Gee whiz, a way that you can do this is to quarantine players,’” Manfred said, adding later, “And then you’re going to start a 4 1/2 month season, and your life is going to be hotel to ballpark, back to hotel, room service, not see your family.” “So then we realized, gee, that’s pretty tough. So then we started talking about including families, and you realize as you get into that phase that you get into quarantine numbers that are insane.” In an interview with MLB Network Monday evening, Manfred said, “We knew that we were going to have positives at some point in time. I remain optimistic that the protocols are strong enough that it will allow us to continue to play, even through an outbreak like this, and complete our season.” “I don’t put this in the nightmare category,” he added. Baseball adjusted its schedule so that teams would play only within their geographic divisions this season, yet reduced travel is still travel, with all it entails — flights, bus rides, checking in and out of hotels, meals, hauling equipment from clubhouse to clubhouse, and so on. Some of the official safety rules seemed unrealistic and have been routinely broken, such as the ban on high-fiving and spitting, strict social distancing in the dugout and replacing any balls touched by multiple players. Scott Servais, the manager of the Seattle Mariners, said Monday that players and staff must be more vigilant. At big moments in games, he said, safety protocols have been ignored. “I think we’re saying all the right stuff, but then you watch the games,” he said. “We have to do the right thing. And sometimes you let your emotions get in the way, you just react, and we weren’t clearly thinking and slowing it down enough in those spots.” David Price, a veteran pitcher for the Los Angeles Dodgers who opted out of playing this season, citing his family’s health, questioned the sincerity of baseball’s commitment to players’ well-being. “Now we REALLY get to see if MLB is going to put players health first,” Price wrote on Twitter on Monday. “Remember when Manfred said players health was PARAMOUNT?! Part of the reason I’m at home right now is because players health wasn’t being put first. I can see that hasn’t changed.”

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 29, 2020

Another Yankees-Phillies game is postponed over virus concerns By JAMES WAGNER

he New York Yankees’ game against the Philadelphia Phillies on Tuesday night was postponed for a second straight day amid concerns over a coronavirus outbreak involving another team. Phillies manager Joe Girardi confirmed the decision in an interview Tuesday afternoon with MLB Network Radio, according to an Associated Press report. The teams’ game Monday night had been postponed after news of an outbreak of the coronavirus on the Miami Marlins, who played three games at the Phillies’ Citizens Bank Park over the weekend. Phillies players and staff members received additional testing Monday; the results of those tests have not been announced. The visiting clubhouse at the ballpark was being disinfected, as well.

The Yankees, who arrived in Philadelphia on Monday, have been sequestered in their hotel and were not allowed to go to Citizens Bank Park on Monday. To stay active, some worked out indoors. But after Tuesday’s postponement, the Yankees planned to leave town. They were expected to return to New York on Tuesday afternoon and work out at Yankee Stadium. The last time they played was Sunday in Washington, defeating the Nationals, 3-2. The Marlins’ scheduled game against the Baltimore Orioles on Tuesday was called off Monday. The Marlins have at least 18 confirmed positive cases among their players and coaches, according to a person familiar with the matter who was not authorized to discuss the results. It was reported Tuesday that four more Marlins players had tested positive.

An empty Citizens Bank Park in Philadelphia on Monday.

Multiple-time Super Bowl winner Hightower among several Patriots to opt out of upcoming NFL season By RT NEWS

ive players from the New England Patriots have announced that they are to opt out of the upcoming NFL season after citing health concerns related to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. Pro Bowl linebacker Dont’a Hightower was joined by teammates Danny Vitale, Marcus Cannon, Brandon Bolden and Najee Toran in announcing that they will not be available for selection for the 2020 season due to start in September. This means that each of the players will forgo several millions of dollars in yearly salary. The loss of these players -- and Hightower in particular -- will come as a blow to Bill Belichick’s Patriots, who lost legendary starting quarterback Tom Brady to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in the off-season -- the first time in two decades that the famous Brady-Belichick tandem has been broken. While Brady’s departure wasn’t related to the coronavirus pandem-

NFL training camps are kicking off, but there are some players who won’t be there, and they won’t be suiting up in 2020, either. ic, the global health crisis has left its mark on the Patriots more than any other team so far in the NFL. In Hightower’s case, the leader of the team’s linebacking unit totaled 71 tackles, 5.5 sacks and four passes defended last season, but the team will now have to find another

defensive anchor after he revealed that he and his fiancee had a baby this month and that he is “more concerned with the health of our family than football -- especially the new addition to our family.” The loss of veteran starting right tackle Cannon is another blow to

the team, though Belichick is expected to plug in last year’s thirdround draft pick Yodney Cajuste to fill the hole. The absence of fullback Vitale and running back Bolden, meanwhile, further stretches the Patriots’ running game -- something they are expected to rely heavily upon in the initial stages of the post-Brady era. The Patriots playing squad is expected to arrive at the team’s Gillette Stadium for comprehensive COVID-19 testing ahead of the return of team training activities. It was previously revealed by the NFL that no pre-season games will take place in advance of the league’s kickoff in the second week of September. However, the practicalities of playing a full NFL season as normal (albeit without fans in stadiums) has been called into question after more than a dozen positive coronavirus tests for players from the Miami Marlins threatened to impede, or even derail, the Major League Baseball season just days after it began.

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 29, 2020

That almost apology for the 1980 Olympic boycott helps. A little. By MATTHEW FUTTERMAN

he athletes who would have represented the United States at the 1980 Summer Olympics in Moscow are an older crew now, two generations removed from missing what for some was a once-in-a-lifetime chance in the spotlight. Some are retired or semiretired from their post-athletic careers. Some are grandparents. Life has happened. And yet no one in a position of authority has ever made a formal apology for what even President Jimmy Carter, who ordered the American boycott to protest the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, has said was a mistake. Olympic Games past and present are on a lot of minds this time of year, since the 2020 Tokyo Games would have been going on right now had they not been postponed until 2021 because of the coronavirus pandemic. So on July 19, the 40th anniversary of the opening ceremony of the Moscow Games, the chief executive of the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee (USOPC), Sarah Hirshland, posted a letter that came awfully close to an apology. In the letter, addressed to “the athletes of the 1980 U.S. Olympic team,” she wrote: “It’s abundantly clear in hindsight that the decision to not send a team to Moscow had no impact on the global politics of the era and instead only harmed you — American athletes who had dedicated themselves to excellence and the chance to represent the United States. “We can clearly state you deserved better. You deserved the support of an inspired nation, to be celebrated for representing our country with pride and excellence.” Hirshland’s letter came three months after former Vice President Walter Mondale delivered a partial apology. “I think we did the right thing,” Mondale told The Wall Street Journal in April. “But I’m sorry about how it hurt them.” The effect has been mixed. For some athletes, there was a degree of appreciation, but as Benn Fields, the U.S. champion in the high jump that

The United States led a boycott of the 1980 Summer Olympics in Moscow. While 65 nations refused to participate in the Games, 80 nations did. year, put it, “It’s a little too late, 40 years later.” That is not the fault of Hirshland, who has held her job for only two years. Also, the USOPC, which promoted the 1980 athletes recently on TeamUSA.org, considers them Olympians, though the International Olympic Committee does not. The 1980 boycott was the result of several months of ultimatums and ultimately failed negotiations after Carter began to push hard for it early that year. The USOPC dared not defy the president, who tried to garner support from as many allies as possible. Ultimately dozens of countries, including Canada and West Germany, joined the boycott. But in the decades since, most international sports officials and many political leaders have fought to discourage Olympic boycotts, arguing they merely sacrifice an athlete’s right to compete and make a living, and

don’t lead to changes in policy. Some of the athletes did not see the Hirshland letter, which was posted on the USOPC website and Twitter, and also distributed by the organization’s alumni group. The 1980 athletes aren’t exactly the Twitter generation, and email databases are not always up to date. Regardless, it turns out 40 years has helped heal some scars, though only some. “I haven’t seen the letter, and I’ve moved on from 1980,” Renaldo Nehemiah, 61, a former world record-holder in the 110-meter hurdles who was considered a favorite for a gold medal in Moscow, responded in a text message. “No words can change history. Fortunately, 1980 didn’t define me or my career.” Nehemiah did not wait for 1984, deciding instead to pursue a career in the NFL at a time when the Olympics were basically an amateur-only affair

and training four more years meant passing on earning income. Others did wait. Steve Scott, who ran the mile, and Edwin Moses, the 400-meter hurdles champion, competed in 1984 and 1988. Tracy Caulkins picked up three gold medals in swimming in 1984. And yet even for those who got another chance, missing 1980 still sticks in their craw, and Hirshland’s letter was something of a salve. The winning time in Moses’ absence in the event in Moscow was 48.70, more than a second slower than the winning time he ran in 1976. “I could have done a cartwheel at the end of the race in 1980 and still won,” said Moses, 64, who also received a personal letter from Susanne Lyons, the chair of the USOPC, acknowledging the unfortunate decisions of 1980. “I appreciated that,” he said of the letter. Fields, the high jumper, spent four years after his 1976 graduation from Seton Hall preparing for the 1980 Games. He was inches off the world record and thought he had a good chance to break it in Moscow and win a gold medal. He hoped to spin that fame into marketing opportunities. Instead, he became one of more than 450 members of the American team to receive the Congressional Gold Medal, the highest civilian honor that can be bestowed by Congress, at a ceremony held when the athletes should have been in Moscow preparing to compete. Because of financial restraints and the large number of medals needed, they were given goldplated bronze medals. Fields and other Olympians have heard the story of Jeff Blatnick, a wrestler, meeting the president on a plane and introducing himself as a 1980 Olympian. Blatnick said Carter told him the boycott was a bad decision. Now Fields has Hirshland’s nearapology. His response to it was neither excitement nor exuberance. It wasn’t total disappointment, either, he said. “At least they decided at an appropriate time to recognize us,” he said. “Now we are waiting for the real congressional medals.”

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 29, 2020

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

(Mar 21-April 20)

You don’t like it when things come easily to you. A challenge makes you feel excited and alive. Someone is being secretive and you find this intriguing. Travel with a friend will strengthen the connection between you. It doesn’t matter how far you go, pleasure will come through a change of scenery.

Taurus

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 29, 2020

(April 21-May 21)

Security can be found from within. You have been looking for emotional security in another person. This is causing you to make choices that aren’t honouring your truth. It’s hard to stabilise yourself when you are picking up other people’s emotions and this is knocking you off balance. A little pampering will make you feel good and can bring you back into your balance again.

Libra

(Sep 24-Oct 23)

Get to know a new partner better before unleashing your gregarious side. Take responsibility for your actions. If you regret a recent break up, a reconciliation is not an impossibility. It may be up to you to hold out an olive branch but if this is important enough, you won’t mind taking the initiative.

Scorpio

(Oct 24-Nov 22)

A home improvement project will give you a chance to be creative. Whether you’re painting a drab room, landscaping the garden or designing a piece of furniture, you will enjoy using your imagination at every turn. In your effort to improve your surroundings, there will be benefits for others too.

Gemini

(May 22-June 21)

Sagittarius

(Nov 23-Dec 21)

Think twice, or thrice even, before making a big commitment. Ask yourself whether you really want to land yourself in a situation that could make you feel like your hands are tied. If you make the wrong choice you won’t get much sympathy from a close friend whose advice you ignored.

A joint commitment is taking up too much of your time. You entered this agreement willingly and you have learned a lot about yourself from the experiences it has brought you. Yet you are ready to move on. If you continued any longer you would start feeling trapped and you would begrudge the arrangement. Leave now while the going is good.

Cancer

(June 22-July 23)

Capricorn

(Dec 22-Jan 20)

Keep control over your emotions. Think before you speak. Be careful about whom you confide in. Someone will try to trip you up mentally or catch you off your guard. Whatever their motives, it will be sensible to bide your time. If you sense what they are up to, you will get the chance to turn the tables on them.

Leo

(July 24-Aug 23)

The chance to travel will be hard to resist. Make certain others who are involved know what to expect. A misunderstanding could ruin what you had hoped to be a special experience. Be certain to get reservations in writing and keep relatives who live some distance away informed about what you are planning.

Virgo

(Aug 24-Sep 23)

A gentle approach is recommended in all relationships. Some people will appear hypersensitive. What you may not realise is that your words may sound critical without you meaning to appear this way. Courtesy is a critical component within the workplace. Listening to the advice of an expert will serve you well.

Part of the attraction you feel for someone is that they are charming, honest and respectful. It means a lot to you to know they listen to your views and are interested in what you have to say. Continue to build this relationship. Are you single? You need more from romance than a lover who keeps you happy in the bedroom.

Aquarius

(Jan 21-Feb 19)

You haven’t wanted to let anyone down and that’s why you have fulfilled obligations you took on recently. It hasn’t been easy but you’ve done it. You should be proud of yourself. You now need to take a break. Don’t feel guilty if you are ready to withdraw to the background.

Pisces

(Feb 20-Mar 20)

It may only be modestly helpful to your aspirations but a neighbour’s tips and suggestions will be worth listening to. You might be surprised by how much interest someone is taking in you. Use your persuasiveness to get what you want, in the nicest possible way of course.

Answers to the Sudoku and Crossword on page 29

Wednesday, July 29, 2020

CARTOONS

Herman

Speed Bump

Frank & Ernest

Scary Gary

Wizard of Id

For Better or for Worse

The San Juan Daily Star

Ziggy

The San Juan Daily Star

Wednesday, July 29, 2020

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