Dear Editor,
The proximate cause of the failings of the Georgetown City Council over the past three decades to provide the range of services to citizens within the boundaries of the Municipality as prescribed in the Municipal and District Councils Act is rooted not in inadequacy of resources; not in ‘miserly subventions’ but in the corruption, incompetence, arrogance and clear lack of political will to deliver among those at the helm at City Hall.
There was no interest at all on the part of the Council over these years in remedying the many shortcomings of Council and so improve the services they provide. Indeed, much energy was expended diverting attention from the inadequacies of those at the helm of the Council who must ultimately be held accountable for its failings and blaming the PPP/C Government.
City Council’s poor management of the affairs of the City over the several decades is due in large measure to poor management of resources at its disposal and devoting too much of its time and energies at trying to make the PPP/C Government look bad.
The frequent outbursts of lack of financial resources by those at the helm of the City Council must be seen for what they are: clever attempts at political posturing and machinations aimed at excusing themselves from culpability to provide the services they are legally required by Law to deliver to citizens in return for the rates and taxes they pay. Council appeared unable or unwilling or disinterested in carrying out its mandate.
No ongoing Debt Recovery Drive: There is an obvious lack of interest in going after the huge debt estimated at B with interest. Even the Amnesty offered to debtors does not attract the desired results which one would expect such offers to attract because the Debt Recovery Unit does not appear to be proactive. Furthermore, what is collected is poorly managed. Expenditure controls are almost nonexistent notwithstanding the recommendations of the Burrowes Enquiry; the Ramon Gaskin and the Auditor General Reports. These reports all offer serious recommendations for improvement in the financial situation of the Council and the range and quality of services the Council provides. The Council appears to be interested only in those things in which members have a personal interest, notably staff loans and advances, overtime abuse, rental of trucks instead of fixing their own, haemorrhaging of scarce resources. Or is it that, in the APNU+AFC Government, Council is confident that it has a Banker to whom it could always turn in times of need eg to pay Solid Waste Contractors?
Market Revenue is used primarily to help meet employment costs that include scores of inactive, underemployed staff of the City Council administration and very little of it is spent on maintaining or expanding or improving market infrastructure or, what is even more desirable, providing additional market infrastructure and so address the sanitation and environmental challenges occasioned by illegal vending.
Reports of vendors paying City Constables (the latter are not authorised to collect revenue) and no receipts issued, go uninvestigated while the City Council has been losing millions through corruption by revenue collectors. There are also reports that thousands collected by City Hall officials from Bourda vendors and persons vending along Merriman’s Mall do not find its way into the Council’s coffers.
Meanwhile, City Hall is yet to formulate a relocation plan for illegal vendors who have been removed or put on notice that they will have to relocate shortly. I call on the Council: do not allow your own selfish agenda to inhibit/frustrate the work of Council.
Sincerely,
Norman Whittaker
