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The Fiasco South of the Border Isn’t Over Yet

"I was also in a meeting at the SAT (Mexican IRS) with their legal department, Banjercito (the military bank Temporary Import fees are paid to), Aduana (Customs),  and other agencies, with Maria Elena Carrillo, the attorney for our Mexican Marina Owner’s Association," reports Tere Grossman, president of the Mexican Marina Owner’s Association. "We told them our idea about changing the TIPs. They are being changed, and new ones will start to be used in a couple of months."

‘In a couple of months’ could mean anything in Mexico, so don’t hold your breath.

"Maria Elena spent all day at the SAT," continues Grossman, "and they gave her the paperwork to release 83 boats from our Marina San Carlos. That means we only have nine boats that are still impounded. Two of these boats have been abandoned, one was sold in Mexico, and some are owned by Mexican nationals.

About 20 of the boats in our marina didn’t have a TIP or had an expired TIP. The day after the inspection by AGACE, our marina personnel applied for new permits, and paid for them, on behalf of the owners in order to protect the boats. Initially AGACE didn’t want to accept the TIPs, but after my trip to Mexico City, they decided to change their minds. One of the boats was sold in Mexico with a TIP, which is a no-no. On the back of the TIP it clearly states that the boat had to be taken out of Mexico to get a new TIP. I know that foreign owned boats are bought and sold all the time in Mexico, but in this case the owner hadn’t been careful to make a bill of sale that say the boat was being sold in the U.S., so SAT has proof that it was sold in Mexico. I don’t know what will happen with that one. The owners of boats that didn’t have TIPs or had expired TIPs will have to pay small fines.

"Thanks to this action by AGACE, I have never worked as hard in my life as in the last three months! We were lucky that the Marina Owner’s Association lawyer had worked for the SAT many years, and knows all the ins and outs, as they have looked at all documents with a magnifying glass. That said, some foreign boat owners don’t take Mexican law — such as the need for TIPs — seriously. We usually don’t accept anyone without insurance or a TIP, but often they promise they will bring them the next time they come down. And they don’t. We often send them to another marina. That marina was lucky their boats weren’t inspected by AGACE."

While countless foreign cruisers are currently having a glorious time cruising Mexico, there are still more than a few unlucky ones who are still wrapped up in the grips of the Mexican bureaucracy, living lives that are right out of Kafka. We say "unlucky," because in many cases the boats complied with all Mexican law. Given the recent release of 88 more boats — see above — more than half of the boats impounded by AGACE have been released. But that hardly does anything to solve the problems of those whose boats are still trapped. Consider the following report, greatly paraphrased for clarity, sent by a captain to the boat’s owners:

"The owners of four other boats and I have just spent the last three hours with SAT (the Mexican IRS). We have been signing documents and writing ‘acceptance of document’ letters — all dictated to us — in Spanish. If anyone even wrote the date in English, it was unacceptable! The number of copies required, the need to write long pieces in Spanish — it was insane. With that over, we need to go back to the AGACE office again — about an hour drive away — and present all the papers. The same papers I have already presented! They say the boat should then be released in seven to 10 working days. But that’s the same thing we were told a month ago."

This boat, which we’re assured has all documents and checked into Mexico properly, has been impounded for three months. One can only imagine what the owners of the boat will tell their friends when asked about how they liked their time ‘cruising’ Mexico.

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You didn’t want to be transiting the Santa Cruz Harbor entrance this weekend.
So you’re in charge of Search & Rescue for the Coast Guard, and somebody calls and says "My friend who is sailing a 24-ft boat from Hawaii to San Francisco sent me a message that read, ‘I lost my life raft, in danger now.’"
With the America’s Cup in an off year and the next AC World Series not having started yet, fans of stadium racing on big catamarans fortunately have another option; the Extreme Sailing Series.