I am actually DONE with trying to find or make excuses. This year I had to have our property electrified due to the number of robberies we had in the past couple of years. This is not the island I first visited 20 years ago. I think that dive tourists can still have a decent dive holiday but their eyes need to be wide open that the "troubles" seen elsewhere in Mexico have arrived in Cozumel. Until they are widely exposed, and people demand that police aggressively deal with them, they will continue. Sweeping them under the carpet and making excuses just allows it to continue. And THAT, ultimately will hurt the island, its residents, and its businesses until someone deems it a big enough problem to address.
We are planning our next trip there during which time we were going to look for an apartment to rent. This casts a shadow on our plans. If much of the crime there is dealing drugs then I suppose the cruise ships will continue to supply customers, however this incident is the kind of thing that might get the cruise ships to find another port.
We're kind of off the rails here, but there are some serious points being made.
@MMM, I feel for your frustration. We've been looking for a place to buy for over six months, and between the limited inventory and security problems we just haven't found anything we're excited about. Reading many of the burglary reports and issues with police response (more on that in a minute) has changed the way we look at a property. That house with the nice high wall? Yeah, but what about the vacant lot behind it where someone could put up a ladder unseen? No hurricane shutters on the windows? We use that as a security perimeter. Corpus Christi, where a lot of (relatively) rich expats live (part time, with AirBnB rentals, so no one knows who belongs and who doesn't)? No thanks. Give me somewhere in the locals' neighborhoods, even if the neighbor likes 1980's disco and puts up a ... structure(?) ... to live in that looks less robust than Bart Simpson's treehouse. Quiet street? No, I'd like a street with regular and constant traffic, thank you.
@JamesBon92007, Facebook (for all it's ills) has a lot of information about the goings on in Cozumel if you're interested, but don't let the fact that Cozumel is not (or at least not any longer) the Garden of Eden derail your plans. Landlords generally like renting to expats - they have money, take care of the place, and aren't going to move in with a large extended family. They pay their bills, and if they don't, they probably don't know the landlord/tenant laws, so they're easier to get rid of (even if that's not an accurate perception). But as I make the point above, if you want to live among all the expats, there will be problems. As Willie Sutton said, "I rob banks because that's where the money is.” Besides, rents are cheaper in the 'hood.
Cozumel has many problems. They just tore up a chunk of the jungle to extend a road south, because the coastal road is often snarled with traffic, and the cruise ship passengers don't like sitting in a taxi for an hour (the horror!). I think much of the crime problem comes with the breakneck pace of development, but the local mayor and Mexico want the tourist dollars. What I don't understand is why more of that money isn't reinvested in the community - by some reports the Cozumel police force is down several
hundred officers from a few years ago. Combined with the exploding population of workers to support the tourist industry (and more will be coming to support Disney's new pier), is crime all that much of a surprise? I suspect the same thing would happen in the US or in Europe or anywhere else under similar conditions.
Cozumel is becoming a "bubble". I noted above the preference of landlords to rent to expats - but what does that do to the locals who need a place to live? When I go to a restaurant, do I tip 10% like the locals, or 20-25% like in the US? How much do I tip the volunteer baggers at the grocery, who prominently display their tips on the counter, including a couple of US dollars? A few expats coming through the line in an hour, dropping a dollar or two, and suddenly the volunteers are making more money than the employed cashiers. And don't even get me started on the taxis...
And finally, regarding the shootings today, the police have clarified that the shots where fired when they interdicted a kidnapping in the staging/parking area for the car ferry. The bad guys (one with a bullet to the head) were trying to drive to the hospital when they were stopped by the police at 11th and 20th. I've walked all over centro, from the airport road to San Miguel II, and from Melgar to Sam's. I've walked many of the streets east of Coldwell (30th) looking for houses for sale. Never had a problem, and almost everyone is happy to return a "Hola, buenos dias/buenas tardes". But as someone else pointed out, I'm looking for houses, not women or drugs.
