Aserrí, San José

Building despite a closure seal

There is a visible “Clausurado” seal and the works are carrying on anyway.

Who is responsible

Municipalidad de Aserrí

Construction permits and closure orders, business and liquor licences, rubbish collection, roads, and the canton’s Maritime Terrestrial Zone.

You must identify yourself

There are no verified contact details for this canton yet.

We do not invent them or copy another canton’s: a wrong number burns the single attempt you were going to make. The municipality’s official site is the best place to find them — and if you confirm them, write to us so we can add them.

Official siteaserri.go.cr
ComplaintsComplaints page

Site checked on 2026-08-31

Almost no municipality has an online complaint form. File in writing — email or the counter — and always ask for a reference number. With no acknowledgement, the complaint does not exist. Every municipality also has a Contraloría de Servicios (Law 9158).

What it rests on: Código Municipal N.º 7794; Ley de Construcciones N.º 833

Ministerio Público — Fiscalía

Crimes: threats, unlawful occupation of property, disobeying authority (for example, carrying on building despite a closure order), environmental damage.

You must identify yourself

A criminal complaint is filed in person at the Fiscalía or OIJ and is made under oath. It is not a form-filling exercise: if the case is serious, go with a lawyer.

Verified on 2026-08-30

Parallel routes

These are not alternatives: they are separate doors you can knock on at the same time, and sometimes the one that answers is not the first.

ICT — Zona Marítimo Terrestre

If the works are within the 200-metre maritime zone, ICT shares jurisdiction with the Municipality.

Together with the Municipality, it oversees the 200-metre maritime zone: the first 50 metres are inalienable public land where nothing may be built.

You must identify yourself

WebZona Marítimo Terrestre

What it rests on: Ley sobre la Zona Marítimo Terrestre N.º 6043

Verified on 2026-08-30

Procuraduría General de la República

Law 6043 charges the PGR with handling and litigating maritime-zone complaints.

Under Law 6043 it handles maritime-zone complaints and litigates against violators. It also takes online complaints about corruption by public officials.

Confidential on request

OnlineDenuncia en línea

What it rests on: Ley N.º 6043, artículo 74

Verified on 2026-08-30

SITADA — Sistema Integrado de Trámite y Atención de Denuncias Ambientales

If there is also felling, infill or earthworks, that is environmental damage and goes through SITADA.

Environmental complaints online: felling, wetland infill, earthworks, water or air pollution, waste, wildlife, protected areas and noise. It issues a tracking number.

Confidential on request

OnlineIngreso de denuncias
WebConsultar mi denuncia
Phone1192 — Apoyo para llenar la denuncia

No account or password needed. It asks for your details but has a checkbox to treat them as confidential — tick it. Save the complaint number: it is how you follow the case.

Verified on 2026-08-30

What it rests on

Carrying on building despite an active closure order constitutes disobedience to authority under the Penal Code.
Construction Law 833 and Municipal Code 7794.

That is why two documents work better than one: the municipal one so the closure gets enforced, and the criminal one before the Prosecutor for the disobedience. They are separate procedures and move independently.

What to gather before writing

Gather this before you write. A backed complaint gets investigated; an unbacked one gets filed away.

A photo of the seal with its number and date legible. That number links your complaint to the file the Municipality already has open.
Dated photos of the works progressing, taken from the street or your own property.
If you can, photos of the same spot on two different dates: the progress is the fact.

Draft the document

It builds as you type. Anything you leave blank stays marked in brackets for you to fill in by hand — a visible [PENDIENTE] beats an invented fact.

Your detailsFull nameCédula, DIMEX or passportAddressEmail for official noticesRequired in practice: it is where the answer arrives and where the ten-day clock runs.PhoneAsk that my details be treated as confidential

The facts

The document you file must be in Spanish. Write the facts below in whichever language you are comfortable with — the AI step further down translates them and gives you a plain-English summary of what you are signing. If you skip that step, write the facts in Spanish or have someone read them over before you send.

Exact location *District, directions and, if you can, a Google Maps or Waze link. “Across from the supermarket” is not enough for an inspector to find it.Adds where you are right now, with a map link. Only use it if you are at the spot — if you are writing from home about works elsewhere, the coordinates would point at your house. As with everything here, they leave your phone only inside the document you send.Seal number and dateIf they are legible in your photo, copy them here. It is the single most useful fact in the complaint.What is happening *Facts, not opinions. What you saw and heard yourself — not hearsay, not assumptions.Since whenAn approximate date works. “Since March 2026”.What you have already triedCalls, visits, earlier complaints and their reference numbers. This is what later lets you escalate.

AddresseeMunicipalidad de AserríMinisterio Público — Fiscalía

Your document

Open in your email

If your email opens truncated or empty, that is a limit of the mail program, not of the document: use “Copy the document” and paste it in by hand.

Want an AI to polish it? Copy the block below and paste it into Claude, ChatGPT or whichever you use. It carries instructions to improve the wording and invent nothing. Check the result before sending: you sign it, you answer for it.

The draft is saved only in this browser. If the phone is shared, clear it when you finish.

Is your case more tangled than this?

It happens often: the noise comes from works that also lack a permit, and the owner turns out to be the same person who blocked your right of way. When three things overlap, a guide organised by category falls short.

This is where a language model — Claude, ChatGPT, whichever — genuinely helps: tell it the whole tangle, out of order, the way you would tell a neighbour, and ask it to separate how many distinct matters there are and who handles each. Then come back here and build one document per matter.

But know how it fails, because it fails in a dangerous way.

These models invent articles, deadlines, decrees and even whole institutions, and they do it in flawless Spanish with great confidence. Turning up at a counter citing a decree that does not exist costs you the case and your credibility, and the person behind the counter will not explain why.

The rule: every institution, law, article or deadline an AI gives you, check it here before you use it. Who does what. If it is not in that directory, treat it as false until you confirm it on the institution’s own page.

And if the tangle involves property, money or someone threatening you, no AI replaces a lawyer. There is free legal help: where to find it.