Scott Brown

HOA President at La Tortuga, Property Manager in Akumal Norte, and recent Vecinos Vice President

Akumal has been my home for nearly forty years. I’m a native Spanish speaker and a Mexican citizen. I work at Akumal Direct and Locogringo as a reservations and property manager, so I am in Akumal Norte five to six days a week.

Everyone who knows me knows that I’m easy to work with. My personal and work background means I understand the perspectives of both long-term full-time residents and newer, part-time second home owners, and I respect the views and concerns of both, and everyone in between. I’m a consensus builder by nature, which is something our community badly needs after the past several years.

After a year serving as your Vice President, I’m now running for President because I feel that the organization has been losing community support and I believe I can help turn that around. My goal is to improve our community’s confidence in the association through respectful, transparent, and forward-looking leadership. Our members are our greatest asset, and I hope my approach will inspire more of our members to contribute their time, talents, and pesos to the association for the betterment of all.  Vecinos needs everyone's support for our community be successful.  

My top goals for 2025 are to bring our community back together with better, more frequent, more inclusive communication, to improve membership and donations, and to continue the association’s ongoing work on security and government relations. I am our main contact with the Target Group (our Pluma security company), and I take the lead on maintenance of the Pluma gates, cameras, and buildings, which are roles I'm accustomed to as a property manger. My background and language skills make me well suited to work with both the Patronato (the local group that helps manage Guardia Nacional’s presence in Akumal Norte, among other things) and the government agencies whose support we need to maintain our infrastructure and our independence.

This is a critical moment in the history of Akumal and Vecinos. We need to value and respect our past, and those who have donated so much time and energy to getting us to where we are today, but now is the time to take Vecinos and North Akumal into the future. We must move forward to become the most effective, professional, inclusive association we can be and accomplish everything we need to accomplish to preserve and protect our community. I believe I can lead us there and I ask for your support and your vote.  

Please feel free to contact me with any questions at akumalic@gmail.com or +52-984-100-4169.  

Meet and Greet with Scott Brown on Zoom on Monday, February 10 at 5:00 p.m. Akumal time:

Please click here to watch a recording of the call.
Passcode: hd73y=&^

Dan Freeman

Owner of Casa Gatos and former Vecinos President

I am the owner of Casa Gatos and was past president of Vecinos. I am running again because I see the next two years as a time of association change. I feel the primary task of the new president is to find a way back to a unified neighborhood. After all, the competition from overdevelopment all around us is great. We need to redefine ourselves as a place of culture, arts, and science with an emphasis on our unique location that offers easy access to so many ancient Mayan sites and wonderful cenotes.  

We will achieve the best results for the entire community by returning to our original mission: honoring our agreements made with Tulum. By complying with the terms of these agreements, Vecinos is given recognition by Tulum to be the representative of the community to the government. Our Tulum agreements give us a degree of self-determination in deciding how we want our future to be.

Dan's Proposals:

1. Creation of Our Own Pluma-Entry Officers’ Service. Trained with the Vecinos operation guide, managed and paid by an independent operating service hired by Vecinos. This would save us half of the cost of the current guard service, which is $780,000 annually, while the proposed Vecinos guard attendant program is estimated at $400,000 annually.
   
   
2. Creation of a Maintenance Service Team. This proposal involves hiring three permanent staff members. The staff will maintain infrastructure services, clean parks, roads, and the main entrance. Additionally, by working with beachfront gardeners, we would create a program for cleaning the beach. The estimated staffing cost would run approximately $350,000 annually.
   
   The cost of the Pluma and maintenance staff would be equivalent to what we are presently spending annually for the current pluma Target guard service at $780,000 annually as versus a total cost of our new proposed programs at $750,000 annually. This cost includes health and social security for the staff.
   
   
3. Environmental and Safety Initiatives. Working with the Vecinos Government Committee, to further their programs for cleanup of our community environment.
   • Sewage Installation recommendations (actual protection for the mangrove, lagoon, reef and beach)
   • Recycling
   • Sidewalk installation (another step in furthering safety for owners, guests and visitors)
   • Underground electric lines (lessening the number of power outages in Akumal Norte)
     
     
4. Creation of Community PR Committee. PR mission: promotion of Akumal Norte as travel destination. Working with travel writers and travel magazines to push Akumal Norte as a culture, arts and nature destination. Promoting to university programs dealing with ancient architecture, culture and environmental studies. Stay in our community and work with programs sponsored by our local colleges. These are my thoughts and dreams please bring your skills and let's achieve these ambitions.
   
   
5. Improvement of the Association’s Information Transparency. Zoom discussion forums four times a year to have public question and answer sessions where you can talk to your President and Board members about those issues that are effecting you as a member of the Akumal Norte community.

I believe that these initiatives and the continued dedication of Vecinos will foster a more united, efficient, and sustainable community. Your support is crucial in making these proposals a reality and ensuring that our community thrives.

Please join me as for a discussion about my proposals. Together, we can achieve a brighter future for all of us. 

Thank you,

Dan

Meet and Greet with Dan Freeman on Zoom on Wednesday, February 12 at 5:00 p.m. Akumal time:

Please click here to watch a recording of the call.
Passcode: 5rq0vAM=

Candidates for Vice President

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Susan Fritz

HOA President at Nahil

I’m Susan Fritz and I am running for Vice President of Vecinos.  My husband, Joel, and I have been in Akumal for over thirty years. We own three properties, and I have served as HOA president at Nahil for eight years.

I am running for Vice President because I believe I can help bring Vecinos together at a time when it really needs to be brought together. I’ve been here a long time and I have built relationships with many neighbors. I have never aligned myself with any one group, and I never will.  I would like to see us all work together for the common cause of protecting North Akumal.  

My experience owning two successful restaurants and working with the public and employees has given me an understanding of how to work well with many different kinds of people.  I started the “Taste of Vail” thirty-five years ago and it is still going strong.  We brought the food and wine industries together in a successful fundraiser for the community with a goal of getting Vail recognized as more than just a ski area, which helped build traffic in its shoulder seasons. Vail and Akumal have a lot in common as destinations that are the uniquely charming gems of their regions. What can we do to help build Akumal's shoulder seasons? 

I believe that our community is not fully aware of all that Vecinos does for North Akumal. I can help get the information out and encourage more owners to join the association. Everyone benefits from the work Vecinos does to protect and preserve our community, maintain our roads, provide security at the Pluma, and work with Tulum to maintain our unique status between public and private communities. 

I believe the relationships I have built in North Akumal, my experience as Nahil HOA president, and my experience in Vail will help me be an effective ambassador for Vecinos and North Akumal, both inside and outside our community.

I hope you will consider voting for me on February 20th and feel free to contact me if you have any questions.

Susan Fritz
970-376-5164  Text and Whatsapp

Meet and Greet with Neil Canter, Susan Fritz, Lisa Wilson, and Peter Swenson - candidates for Treasurer, Vice President, and Vocales - Sunday, February 16 at 4:00 p.m. Akumal time

Please click here to watch a recording of the call.
Passcode: 1%!9xlv+

David Zucker

Owner of Casa Gatos

My connection to Akumal goes back forty-five years. In the eighties and nineties of the past century we came once or twice a year for open water and cave diving. Upon retiring fifteen years ago, we permanently moved here into the house we had purchased ten years before.

Before retiring I ran a manufacturing company for thirty-five years producing products for the printing and packaging, school supply, art supply, picture frame, and display industries.

I had years of experience in community organizations including 501C3 Civic Associations:

1. Treasurer and President of the Philadelphia Graphic Arts Lodge of Bnai Brith.  
   
   
2. Member of the government-funded Project Area Committee for the Washington Square West Rehabilitation Area of Center City Philadelphia, organized to represent the residents of our historic neighborhood (until the federal government decided the transition was complete and we no longer needed funding).
   
   
3. I was then President of the Washington Square West Trust, overseeing a fund that issued grants for projects to improve the neighborhood. 
   
   
4. I was one of the first paying members of the Asociacion de Vecinos de Akumal Norte in 2012 and have been an active member since then, working on many projects, paving the road, installing street lighting, installing topes and drains, building of the community center, and participating in interactions with the municipal government. That was when Vecinos was an informal organization of neighbors interested in working for the community and it wasn’t necessary to be on the board to be active in the community. As the association has grown into a more formal organization, that means becoming an officer, which is why I am now running for Vice-President. We are now faced with new challenges from the government and developments around us and I feel it is important for me to use my experience and knowledge to contribute in sustaining all that makes Akumal the unique community on the Riviera Maya that attracted all of us to settle here.
   

Meet and Greet with Ricardo Mangione, Beryl Van Lierop, David Zucker, and Mike Stone - candidates for Vice President and Vocales - Sunday, February 16 at 1:00 p.m. Akumal time 

Please  click here  to watch a recording of the call.

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