Dear Editor,
I would be grateful if my concerns and disappointment with the crisis after crisis Georgetown has been experiencing – for the past decades under continuous PNC management – can be afforded space in your publication.
I spent the first 11 years of my life in Regent Street, between Bourda and Alexander Streets, in the yard of the store of my uncle, S B Nawbatt, the first to be burnt in the disturbances of the 60s. The next thirty-plus years were spent in Wortmanville, so I am a product of Georgetown.
I remember the days when Georgetown was proudly and legitimately described as the Garden City. Sadly, that description was savagely damaged by the continuous political MISMANAGEMENT of the City. It is inconceivable, and baffles one’s imagination as to how such incompetence could be rewarded by being voted into office election after election. I’m convinced that therein lies the basis for the deplorable situation and condition of Georgetown, and it is exactly the reason for me, a few weeks ago, advocating for the installation of an Interim Management Committee for the City, as a previous Government had to successfully do some years ago.
I was prompted to write again, following a recent letter in which a “Senior Citizen” raised, among other items, the condition of the Le Repentir Cemetery. My brother and grandfather are buried there, and many attempts to locate their graves have been impossible, due to inaccessibility to get anywhere near to where their final resting places are.
I often wonder if such a situation exists anywhere else in the world.
For those who like to take to the streets protesting (as recently as the unimaginable anti-vaccine protests), I suggest their efforts can be very well appreciated by protesting against the condition of this cemetery. I am sure THEIR loved ones are similarly inaccessible.
However, I have a suggestion which I know is going to raise a firestorm. The Bourda Cemetery, which has not been a burial site for decades (maybe for plus or minus a hundred years), is also in a deplorable condition, resembling a jungle in the heart of Georgetown. I remember a suggestion to convert this area into usable space was raised before, and since consensus could not be reached, was abandoned. I am throwing out a suggestion for this cemetery, with all the necessary precautions taken to preserve the sanctity of the deceased, to be converted into a parking lot. The City Council, with efficient management, can garner much needed revenue.
Another suggestion, also made previously, is for the canals along South Road/Croal Street /Avenue of the Republic and other such spaces be covered (to permit removal of covers to allow for cleaning) and for vehicles to park thereon for a fee.
I am impressed by the owner of SleepIn Hotel for his initiative in converting a part of Merriman’s Mall for parking. The voice “in the wilderness” in this case being that of the now irrelevant former Mayor Hamilton Greene. It is obvious that his motives for opposing this arrangement was motivated by reasons only such a relic can contemplate.
Many more businesses need to follow this example, if only to ease the problem of finding safe parking spaces in Georgetown, and for financial gains both for the Council and the businesses.
I am well aware that both these suggestions would rightfully generate much discussion, but am convinced that there is much room for improvement of the City, and therefore any suggestion for ending the CRISIS being engendered by the clique headed for a few years now by the “travelling pandit” must be open for public discussion.
I have refrained, at this time at least, from mention other matters which I’m sure the majority of citizens of Georgetown are fed up with, including the now ongoing attempts by those at City Hall to oppose the acting appointment of a Town Clerk. My hope is that sensible judgement would prevail; and should this not be forthcoming, an NCM may need to be considered for this Council as well.
Tek warning wid the NCM now engaging the Region Four administration.
Sincerely,
H N Nawbatt
