Today, the community surveillance team for El Manglito involves about 20 OPRE members who work in 4 shifts of 6 hours, around the clock. But developing a reliable surveillance process took many years of living through crises that could have easily derailed the whole process – none more potentially discouraging than a night in May of 2011 when one fisherman threw a stone through the windshield of a truck used by the Citizen’s Observatory (Red de Observadores Ciudadanos (ROC)) staff. People were angry and afraid. There were fears that violence would erupt. Instead, the incident of the stone eventually led the formative fishing cooperative (OPRE) and NOS staff to realize that they had to attend to the community’s economic plight.
The Story of the Stone
“When they started the community surveillance work, they weren’t getting paid by NOS,” says long-term Manglito community member, Ramona Méndez. “NOS gave a little help for gasoline. Then, NOS started to provide the surveillance team with some salary for doing the surveillance. For they were still going through economic hardship, and this helped a lot. NOS gave them scholarships for their kids, complete with English and Math lessons. Some guitar lessons, too. And they gave them uniform discounts for school. That’s a lot of income. This financial aid sealed the deal, and the fishers agreed not to fish anymore, as it was all for money that they used to fish illegally. It was all to provide for their families.”