Santa Familia

This morning we went to a meeting with some Rotary folks in San Ignacio. The president and past president joined the Fukais and Joe Carlson, whom you met in Dale’s blog yesterday. The president is the only native Belizean in that group. We also had a member of the water board of the village of Santa Familia, which is just to the northwest of San Ignacio. The past president wanted a central distribution system for Yalbac, with chlorination at the central holding tank. Others thought the expense of piping from the well to all of the houses isn’t justified, and agreed that chlorination is not necessarily reliable and that chlorinated water doesn’t taste good. We agreed to keep thinking about Yalbac, even though their source water is too hard and alkaline that it will require softening and reverse osmosis, and the village has no electricity.

The Fukais then took us to Santa Familia, where we rejoined Robbie, the water board member. She is also from the US, retired after a career in the Air Force. She is a very organized and forceful person. She said that a few years ago the government handed her authority for the village water and a budget of $3. There was a flat rate of $10/month for water, which is pumped from the river to a holding tank, and from which it flows through distribution pipes to the houses. She said she had increased payment rates from 38% to 99% and now has a surplus of $18,000 to make improvements.

Her interest in us is related to her intention to get the school off the village distribution system. There must be major leaks, because the school uses a disproportionately large fraction of the water they pump, and if they can get the school off the system, the pumps will not have to be replaced as often. She wants to install a rainwater catchment system and supply the school from a cistern. The school is fairly large, with 287 students currently, and it has, by my estimate, about 70,000 to 75,000 sq. ft. of roof on four buildings. She thinks they can store enough water to last through the dry season, and she likes the idea of treating what they use to drink.

The school is a Catholic-operated school with government support. The principal thought that the water plan would be approved by the board that oversees all Catholic schools in Belize, so we are encouraged about the potential there.

We met the chairman of the village council, a young man with a vision for progress in the village. We learned that there is another school in the village, a “Christian” school that had not been interested in the catchment system. We talked about the possibility of talking them into cooperating, since the capacity of a treatment system should be enough to sustain the daytime drinking water needs of more than the Catholic school. So we were even more encouraged about Santa Familia.

After lunch we went back to Benque to say good-bye to Father Dan. This was more a sentimental trip for the Stratmans than a business trip, since we had concluded all of our water-related business with him except to tell him about the school in Santa Familia. From there it was back to Spanish Lookout, a Mennonite community between Unitedville and Yalbac, so we could have ice cream from the dairy there.

Dale had been concerned about confirming our meetings in Armenia tomorrow, so while we were heading for Benque, she phoned the general store to leave a message for Filberta. We were also concerned about how to get hold of Michael, the Peace Corps guy. When she asked to leave a message, she found that Filberta was in the store that very moment. Filberta agreed to talk to the other health care worker and to Michael, and a short time later, Michael phoned to confirm that he would be at the meetings. We thanked God for the timing that connected Dale to Filberta and saved us a trip to Armenia to find her and Michael (which would have ruled out ice cream).

Tomorrow morning we plan to go to the Belize zoo, a small zoo with native animals in natural settings. We did this on our way home two years ago, and it was an experience we wanted to repeat and to share with the rest of our group. Tomorrow afternoon we will go to Belmopan for some shopping and a visit to the Department of Rural Development to talk about the Armenia well situation and to Armenia to do chemical tests on the river water.

Chuck