Dear Editor,
In cities all over the world, public restrooms can be found near places of entertainment, near public transportation (bus terminals), near shopping centres, in parks and playfields, close to public buildings, and at large outdoor events, etc.
In Georgetown, it is a whole different story. There is an inadequate amount of toilets available, resulting in many persons urinating and defecating in the open: in fields, bushes, or bodies of water; putting themselves, but more disturbingly children, in danger of contracting deadly faecal-oral diseases, like diarrhoea.
When nature calls a visitor or shopper in downtown Georgetown, how quickly can he or she answer? How quickly can they do so legally? Most persons are forced to let loose – urinate — in public. However, there is always a City Constable waiting to harass such persons, as those constables see it as an opportunity for demanding a bribe.
Open urination, particularly by girls and women, is a challenge to their dignity, and is also a safety issue; as they quite often wait until dark to relieve themselves, putting themselves in danger of attack.
But what is the Georgetown City Council doing about it? They are glibly spending millions of dollars a month to rent a few portable toilets from private contractors, whilst the few permanent facilities owned by the Council have been contracted out to private individuals, and are so badly managed that the public prefers not to use them.
This just shows how lazy the administration of the Council is. With a staff strength of close to 1000 employees, many of whom are sanitation workers, they prefer to divest themselves of the responsibility of managing and maintaining these sanitary facilities, opting instead to give them to private individuals and contractors from whom they could get fringe benefits, such as having some of these portable toilets placed at their residences for their security and other staff.
If the officials at City Hall had any common sense and integrity, they would have used the millions wasted each month on renting portable toilets to construct, around the city, public toilets consisting of small concrete buildings containing one or more toilets (and possibly also urinals). These facilities would also have been available for use by the general public, eliminating the common practice of urinating in public. Those facilities should be accessible to people with disabilities.
If, however, the Council prefers to deploy portable restrooms, which conversely are better suited for camping, outdoor activities, wedding events, construction and large outdoor special events, then they should purchase their own, rather than continue renting; and that would save tens of millions a year. But, then again, who at City Hall cares about the squander of the rates paid by property owners?
Sincerely,
Modi Sankar
