I was renewing my residency permit today and in the small office an American man was in organizing his 90 day stay and trying to get residency papers for his future life in Bonaire. He was told (and we all could hear this very public conversation) that there is a new law tourists can only stay 90 days in Bonaire per calendar year. Can anyone explain this to me?

I think the rule has been there for a while. Remember when they tried to apply it to all the yachties a few years back?

For whatever reason they backed off - sounds like they are now starting to enforce it again. I have no idea how they would track it other than perhaps by passport stamps since they don't use computers at the airport.

And they used to have a rule limiting the duration of any one trip off-island by foreign residents to 4 weeks or less - fortunately they got rid of that one - we kept having to reapply for reentry permits. What a nuisance that was for us frequent travelers...

Jake

I think that George W. Bush emailed Governor Domacasse of Bonaire asking him to take the heat off him. LOL

Hi Ann,
Does the residency renewal have to go through the police department or is it still the Governor's office??
Henk.

Are these changes related to the upcoming change in status to a Dutch entity, some part of Dutch rules?

That 90 days limit for US tourists and other countries exists as long as I know Bonaire (about 25 years ...), for Europeans it always was 6 months. To start to reinforce it again....perhaps they realized that there are a number of Tourists who stay without any permit for any lengths of time ... p.ex. there were quite some angry reactions (several articles in the Extra just 2 weeks ago)from locals about the american couple who just occupies the fisher men house at Playa Frans without any permits and don't want to leave .... there are quite a number of stories

Count your blessings, we have anywhere from 20 Million to who know's how many illegals in the US. I always admired the islands we visited for the manner in which they appeared to take their immigration rules seriously. Immigration should be orderly and controlled.