M&CC to host public day twice weekly

…plans to reclaim City Council lands

By Ramona Luthi

In an effort to distribute the work of administration at City Hall, the Mayor and City Council (M&CC) will be hosting a “public day” twice a week starting from Wednesday, July 13, according to Town Clerk Royston King.

King, at the statutory meeting on Monday, relayed that the Deputy Town Clerk and the Assistant Town Clerk, along with other City Hall workers, would be stationed twice a week at the Agricola Community Centre and in the upper flat of the incomplete Kitty Market.

He explained that the purpose of the initiative was to provide members of the public in the specific areas with the opportunity to voice their concerns and have the matters brought to the attention of the M&CC.

“Beginning from Wednesday, we hope to begin to decentralise the work of administration by asking the clerks, the Deputy Town Clerk and the Assistant Town Clerk, to be available at the Agricola Community Centre, along with the relevant staff, two days a week, and at the Kitty Market, along with the relevant staff, two days a week.

“This, of course, will include members from the City Engineers Department…and they will be there two days a week and they will take all the reports, complaints, they’ll engage the citizens in those areas and will report back to us and you, the council, will obviously receive reports from those areas and get a chance to benefit, because as it is now we’re not doing justice to some of those areas,” the Town Clerk asserted at the meeting.

The Town Clerk also highlighted that persons who required information pertaining to taxes would be able to approach the assigned staff at these two locations to obtain such. However, he emphasised that owing to the lack of security, especially at the unfinished Kitty Market, members of the public would not be able to pay their taxes or conduct any monetary transactions at the public days.

Meanwhile, King said that city lands, including parapets, were continuously being reclaimed from persons who have been squatting on them to ply their trades “rent” free.

“We are continuing to reclaim city spaces and parapets from individuals who have been using them for private enterprise without paying the Council a cent and we will continue to do this throughout the city,” he noted.