From the Publisher's Desk
Include:
“to take in or comprise as part of a whole” (Merriam-Webster Dictionary)
In my home town in the United States where I grew up, the community was comprised of every race, religion and ethnic background imaginable. For a place with only 40,000 people, it was truly a melting pot. Yet despite the differing backgrounds, when a common goal needed to be accomplished, whether it was building a library or renovating the baseball field, everyone pitched in and worked together for the betterment of their community.
 
There is a fundamental common goal for the people of Mazatlán and that is to expand the tourist industry which drives the local economy. To do this, all sectors of the community must work in unison, from the State department of tourism, to the municipal government, to the tourism associations, to the media, to business and private citizens. This approach has worked well for other tourist destinations such as Cabo, Cancún and Puerto Vallarta. Mazatlán, however, has been slow to adopt this basic principle.
 
Over the past eleven years, the Pacific Pearl has experienced a disconcerting lack of support from the State Secretary of Tourism, municipal government and tourism agencies. Our paper (with 2,056,000 distributed copies without missing one month since 1992) and website (with 3.3 million hits a year and climbing) exist to welcome English speaking tourists to Mazatlán with information on events, maps, advice, local customs and points of interest. English speaking tourists from the US and Canada make up the majority of tourists during the winter months. They read our paper to make their stay here more enjoyable and we receive hundreds of compliments yearly on the information we provide. Yet when it comes to including us, supporting us or asking our opinion on this basic common goal, the tourism agencies ignore us.
 
It is the Pacific Pearl advertisers who care about getting the information out to tourists. It is thanks to them that English speaking visitors to Mazatlán know about restaurants, shops, fiestas, theater performances, places to go and things to do. Without our advertisers´ determined desire to inform our readers about their services, the American and Canadian tourist would have few places to turn to for information.
 
Having said this, we feel that change is in the air. We notice a recent influx of younger people with fresh ideas coming into government and local tourism agencies. More money from these sources is being released to promote Mazatlán tourism nationally and abroad. It is time to put aside the partiality and work together toward our common goal.
 
Michael J. Veselik
Publisher
PS. If you don´t find the Pacific Pearl at your hotel, please let us know at 913-0117.