St. Maarten Private Eye

I have personally seen Gypsy drivers in front of the RBTT bank head of town accepting tourists coming down the Greenhouse/Diamond casino alley. This while the taxi;s have stand just in front of the same casino. And this happened during the day in plain view of the waiting taxi drivers.
It took SXM many years to get our taxi drivers and associations to conform to some sort of organization, dress code, change of attitude, and getting respect from government and the cruise association, that I find it hard that they don't beat the crap out of these gypsies that operate so blatantly during day time hours.
I agree our cab drivers are not always professional. I for one hate it when I hear some of them having loud discussions on Front street using foul and vulgar language in front of children, locals and our visitors. But the fact remains that they are registered as tax payers, the tax department knows how to find them. Indeed they pay dues to the harbour and PJIA if they operate there. It is therefore unfair for others to operate illegally taking away bread from the ones who are doing things in a legal manner.
As most associations on SXM are politically rigged, so is the taxi association. it is possible to reform the association to create lower fares for locals if they can show their SXM ID card and to include more routes to difficult to reach places.
But with the type of taxi association that is there now, I doubt this will happen.