Enlarging three rooms in her house in Pelada, in the district of Nosara, in 2017 ended up in a legal decision forcing Heidy Villegas to abandon and demolish her entire home. A ruling from the Criminal Court of the Second Judicial Circuit of Guanacaste, No. 235-2024, issued on October 16, 2024, found Villegas and her husband, Olmedo Padilla, guilty of encroaching upon the Ostional National Wildlife Refuge (Spanish acronym: RNVSO).
According to her, she has lived in the protected area for more than 20 years, has the papers in order to remain there, and, therefore, the demolition is unfair.
“We saw that everyone started to fix up their houses, the hotels started to get nicer, they were completely rebuilt…. We said, ‘Look, that means that it is possible.’ When we were about to finish, MINAE (the Ministry of Environment and Energy) arrived and ordered us to stop the work and told us they were going to report us,” Villegas explained. “I can demolish the rooms, but why my entire house?” she added.
The ruling against Villegas is just the tip of the iceberg. In 2002, there were about 400 families living within the boundaries of the refuge, according to estimates by the National System of Conservation Areas (Spanish acronym: SINAC). There may be more now, but the figure is uncertain because SINAC hasn’t conducted studies to determine how many families there are and which ones have the right to remain.
“In this, we must not be naive or innocent. There are people who have wanted to take advantage of the refugee situation [the fluctuations in the refugee status between state and mixed]…. What this has done is weaken the position of people who have a legitimate right,” commented Mauricio Méndez, deputy director of the Tempisque Conservation Area (Spanish acronym: ACT).
The treasurer of the Playa Pelada Rescue and Development Association, Nadia Alfaro, said they have information that there are around 17 families who have had complaints filed against them in the Pelada sector and that they could be evicted at any moment.
With Heidy’s sentencing and the feeling of unease surrounding new evictions, uncertainty has returned to the community regarding the families who live within the RNVSO staying, an uncertainty that arose when the protected area was created in 1983 through the Wildlife Conservation Law.
Heidy’s situation alerted the community. She’s the one who has the most paperwork out of everyone…. When the community sees that the person who has the most paperwork and everything up to date is evicted just like that,” Alfaro remarked.
The Refuge Belongs to the State
To understand Heidy’s future, and the future of other people living within the protected area, it’s important to understand the laws that apply to RNVSO:
The refuge has been state-owned since its beginning, meaning that the state manages the land. According to Méndez, with the creation of the protected area, evictions seemed inevitable, but a 2009 Constitutional Court ruling, resolution 16892-09, indicated that MINAE and the ACT should “evict only individuals or legal entities whose presence in the environment could affect the purposes or objectives of the Ostional National Wildlife Refuge, as a mass nesting site for Olive Ridley sea turtles.”
The official affirmed that the Court’s ruling was the precursor for SINAC to promote the Ostional Wildlife Refuge Law (Law 9348), which, in 2016, transformed the nature of the refuge into mixed use, meaning that the area would be made up of land owned by the state and by private individuals.
For that purpose, those living within the protected area could apply for concessions to remain if they could prove they had lived in the refuge for at least 10 years prior to the legislation’s approval. However, in February of 2023, the Constitutional Court annulled the law and the refuge once again became solely state-owned.
You can learn more about Law 9348 and its annulment in this article from The Voice of Guanacaste.
In Villegas’s case, she argued that the three rooms were built while the refuge was mixed use. However, the deputy director of the ACT commented that the law had only been in effect “for about a month” because the appeal on the grounds of unconstitutionality that annulled it was filed the same year the law went into effect.
Heidy and her family in Pelada beach 33 years ago.Photo: Heidy Villegas
ACT Said There Wouldn’t Be Evictions, But…
In an interview given by Méndez to The Voice of Guanacaste in 2023, the official maintained that “at SINAC, we’re not planning to evict anyone.” ACT director Nelson Marín also stated that they would exhaust all legal mechanisms to prevent evictions.
But according to Villegas, SINAC is the very entity that is causing her to have to abandon her home. “MINAE says we aren’t being evicted, but you see that it’s a lie because what they do is wash their hands, but they’re the ones reporting us,” Villalta commented.
Meanwhile, Méndez argued that SINAC isn’t filing evictions, but that “if someone starts building, we have to report them.” The official commented that they have filed “many complaints” but didn’t specify how many.
“What the refuge law [No. 9348] has always sought is to regulate the permanence of the people who were there. It hasn’t been to open the door for new people to come; it hasn’t been to allow me to give a house to my children or grandchildren; it hasn’t been to promote real estate development; none of that,” the official added.
For Villegas and Alfaro, defending their ability to remain in the refuge is an issue of justice and equality.
“Equal rights is what we’re pleading for. If I built and they reported me and they’re demolishing [my home], why haven’t they reported or demolished the big ones, who were there before me?” she remarked, referring to several hotels and restaurants in the area that, according to her, are within the refuge and that haven’t been punished despite recent expansions.
The complaints being filed are only for people in the community. We have no evidence of complaints being made against the people behind us, next to us. And not just in Pelada, but in Guiones, too,” remarked treasurer Nadia Alfaro.
Méndez rejects allegations that SINAC acts permissively in the face of some encroachments on the refuge. “If anyone can prove to me that we’ve treated someone unequally, I invite them to report me. Report me, if I do it; report any official. That’s your right. In fact, do it. No one should treat a person who is in the refuge unequally,” he remarked.
Four Decades Without a Management Plan
RNVSO has never had a management plan, even though the protected area was created 42 years ago. This document is a kind of regulatory plan, or the rules of the game, that determines how a protected area should be managed.
According to the ACT’s deputy director, SINAC had its first management plan ready, but it regulated the mixed-use nature granted to the refuge by Law 9348. However, “when the law fell apart, everything fell apart.” Since then, SINAC still hasn’t fulfilled its obligation to have a management plan that adapts to the state-owned character of the protected area.
That’s why Heidy Villegas holds SINAC responsible for her eviction ruling and for reporting the refuge’s inhabitants without first preparing a management plan that specifies the type of development within the refuge.
SINAC isn’t doing its job, which is a management plan, but they do go after anyone who puts a nail in,” said Villegas, referring to the prohibition on remodeling homes within the refuge.
Méndez commented that the ACT is preparing a consultation with SINAC’s legal department to understand the true scope of the management plans and answer the question of whether this document can allow land use dedicated to housing in a state refuge.
“Since what I think doesn’t matter, but what it is, we’re preparing a consultation with MINAE’s legal advisors,” Méndez commented. The official admitted that he doesn’t know how long it might take to resolve the request.
Community Will Mobilize
The Peladas Development Association is convening a meeting that’s open to the community to discuss their right to remain in the refuge. The meeting will be held on March 21 at Olga’s Bar.
In addition, the group plans to organize a trip to the Presidential Palace in April to request clarification regarding the Court’s ruling, which indicated that only those who threaten the sustainability of the ecosystem may be evicted.
“We’re a town here in Pelada Beach, and we don’t plan to leave. We plan to fight until we die, even if we tie ourselves to the gates of all the neighbors, because we’re all in the same situation…. This is my place, this is my home. We’ve left our entire lives here,” Villegas stated.
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