NA council to use $50M subvention to upgrade street lighting, Town Hall

The New Amsterdam Town Council will be using its $50 million central government subvention to execute much needed upgrades to street lighting facilities, the Town Hall building and the municipality’s Esplanade Park.
Last month, Vice President Dr Bharrat Jagdeo had announced sweeping increases in the central Government’s subventions for local Government organs.
He announced that every Neighbourhood Democratic Council (NDC) will now receive $30 million as their new annual subvention, while each municipality will receive $50 million. Previously, NDCs received subventions of about $5 million, while municipalities received about $18 million.

New Amsterdam’s Mayor Wainwright McIntosh said that the municipality has received its full subvention and currently arrangements are being made to have key development projects rolled out.
Among those projects will be repairs to the walls of the Town Hall, along with upgrades to the Esplanade Park and street lighting.
As it relates to the Town Hall Walls, the Council has been for years commenting that a section of the building might soon collapse if needed repairs were not carried out.
The mayor said the Council is still open for suggestions from citizens on projects they might want to be undertaken this year.
“Works will commence shortly with regards to the maintenance of the sidewalls of the municipality. Tenders were submitted and the tenders were open and the contract to resuscitate these sidewalls, that particular contract would have been issued having followed the process that should have been followed. So very soon we will see works commencing with regards to our sidewall there. And please feel free to make contact with the mayor’s office should there be any pressing issues. It is our commitment to ensure every citizen across this beautiful town of New Amsterdam receive the services they are so much in need of.”
According to Mayor McIntosh, efforts are being made to ensure that proper procurement procedures are followed, with bids being prepared for various works. Among the highlighted initiatives, the mayor noted is a street lighting project aimed at enhancing safety and visibility across the town.
“And one of those projects that we will be embarking on is to ensure every constituency has street lights,” the mayor said.
In addition to streetlights, ongoing drainage work is part of the work program for this year. Similarly, upgrades are also planned for Esplanade Park.
“The project in the Esplanade Park, we will complete that project very shortly. We are awaiting the said contractor who would have started the work there within the Esplanade Park. That project is to build a canteen facility within the Esplanade Park. We have some other programs we will be rolling out as a municipality to ensure every constituency benefits from this year’s subvention. With regards to the market, as we speak, the Treasurer’s Department is in the process of rolling out those bids where there will be need for tenders. Those are people doing maintenance work that is happening within the market. Over the weekend period, we would have serviced one of our main gutters in the market and that is to minimize the leakage that vendors are experiencing,” Mayor McIntosh pointed out.