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Happy Holidays
to all of you from all of us at CEA
Dear CEA Supporters and Members,
The past year has been an enormously challenging time for CEA. The CEA Advisory Board became a reality; it's first meeting having taken place in August. The CeMIR program has matured in an exciting way with new alliances and new challenges. In the area of science, we are at the start of a new era with the publication of Environmental Report 2, which includes the 2002 water report, results from the 2002 Turtle Program, papers on wetlands at Akumal and several coral reef ecology and coral disease abstracts. In the coming year CEA hopes to enlarge its laboratory and begin a regional program to map contamination all along the Great Mesoamerican Barrier Reef.
The departure of staff members Edith Sosa Bravo, to return to school, and Jorge Luis Basave, who moved to Amigos de Sian Ka'an, has left us short-handed over much of the year, but we have chosen to proceed slowly with our staff search until the right candidates appeared. This strategy has proved itself a worthy one. With the addition of Kate Riley, an environmental engineer, fluent in Spanish, who is our new project coordinator for CeMIR and liaison with North American Wetland Engineers, I feel that the professional stature of CEA has been increased significantly. Following several years devoted to being a mother, Maria Laurent returned to work with CEA and brought much needed organization to the administration of the office. Maria previously was office manager at the start of CEA. Unfortunately, she will be leaving us soon, but she is leaving us in the very capable hands of Nadia, a biologist fluent in English and Spanish. Maria will be missed, but we are happy to have Nadia joining the CEA staff.
As always, volunteers and interns have played an important role. Helen Brown, who begins graduate work in environmental science at the University of Bristol in England
in January, took charge of this past summer's water quality project. She completed ninety analyses which showed that the quality of Akumal's groundwater, bays and lagoons have improved significantly since 1997, when the last large-scale testing was done. We at CEA can take pride in the knowledge that the 25 constructed wetlands installed by the homeowners and businesses at Akumal have had a positive effect and that we can enjoy the waters of our piece of paradise with comfort and confidence.
In the coming year, CEA hopes to add at least three new staff members, assuming funds are available. These will be a graphic artist, a chief financial officer and a microbiologist. If CEA succeeds in finding funds for the laboratory expansion, three others will be needed to staff the laboratory. Reports and publications are to be moved front and center next year, beginning with in-house publication of the CEA Environmental Report 2.
In March, the National Ground Water Association will publish a book in conjunction with its annual meeting in Merida on the Hydrogeology of the Yucatan Peninsula. I have written one of the chapters, which reviews the geohydrology of the northeastern part of the Peninsula.
Reaching our goal of a contamination-free Akumal by 2005 and a fifty percent reduction in contamination of ground water on the whole of the Mexican Caribbean and beyond by 2010 is a challenging task and cannot be achieved without the continued help of our members and supporters. This year the needs are particularly acute. With the large drop in the stock market, CEA's foundation supporters have suffered huge losses in income and simply do not have the money to support all the programs they once did. To compensate for some of these losses CEA has turned to its internal sources of funds, our rental property, our dormitories, a new EcoNight Program in partnership with the Villas Maya and other Akumal hotels and condos and, of course, our members and supporters. If you are a member, it is important that you renew. If you are not a member, please join. The CEA website tells you how.
Thank you for your support during the past years and we look forward to your continued support at this most critical time. The Great Mesoamerican Barrier Reef needs the help of all of us. No one knows how long we have before damage to the reef passes some invisible threshold into irreversibility. Delay is not an option. With your help we can succeed in shutting off the flow of contamination, look at what has been done already!
On behalf of the CEA staff, I convey our warmest wishes for a happy holiday season,
Charles Shaw, Ph.D.
Director, CEA
 New Cave System Discovered in Akumal
Greg Brown has been exploring a new cave system right in Akumal. To read more about his adventures and the cave system Ak Kimin click here.
 New Scholarship Program
The holiday season is such a special time of caring and giving, but these people from a Mount Pleasant Water Aerobics class, and Bill-in Tulsa's website are amazing. Their concern and caring goes all year round. To learn more about this heartwarming story please click here.
Thank you for your continued support of CEA and remember our on-line store is now open, click here to visit.
If you would like to subscribe or unsubscribe to this newsletter, or simply need to contact CEA please click here.
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