Montego Bay to get city council

WESTERN BUREAU:

MINISTER OF Local Government Arnold Bertram is pushing for Montego Bay to have its own city council before the end of the year. The Minister met with representatives from the St. James Parish Council on Tuesday, and urged the Council to set a timetable for appointment of a city council, as outlined in the Green Paper for Local Government Reform. "The Green Paper has specific implications for Montego Bay," Mr. Bertram told the Council. "We are meeting with the Council to spell out what these implications are and to try to work out a timetable for implementation."

The city council will comprise of elected councillors in the MoBay area, one of whom will chair the new body, as well as business and community leaders. Accord-ing to the Minister the city council will be responsible for the delivery of essential services relevant to the day to day management of the city. The council will have to answer to the people of Montego Bay when Local Government services such as garbage collection, are disrupted.

"It is expected that this city council will take on, in a very serious way the day to day management of service delivery in Montego Bay and focus on the three main services for which Local Government is responsible; solid waste management, fire services and streetlights. From thereon it will seek to co-ordinate other services that relate to the development of the city for whatever other state agency or ministry," Mr. Bertram said.

He announced that city councils should also be up and running in Spanish Town and Portmore in St. Catherine by December. Mandeville, Ocho Rios and St. Ann's Bay and other towns across the island will be targeted next year. Mr. Bertram said there is a specialised focus on the urban growth areas where urbanisation has been largely unplanned for the past 25 years.

But these services will not come cheap for the residents in these urban centres. The improvement in local government services which the city council is expected to bring, could also mean an increase in property taxes for the residents.

"Those who live in the city and want to enjoy the services a city will have to find a way, along with their local authority, to pay for these services, and once you pay, you demand what you pay for," Mr. Bertram explained. "All over the world that is how it is done; you look at your property taxes to see whether it's sufficient to pay for the services. If that is not sufficient you adjust rates to deal with what you need."

The Green Paper on Local Government Reform (A Regional Framework for Local Governance and Development) is proposing the establishment of four regional municipal bodies to replace the 13 Parish Councils which now form the Local Government system.

In addition it is proposing that city councils be set up in all the major towns.

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