By Rayon Dyer, Freelance WriterBLACK RIVER, St. Elizabeth:
A DISPUTE over pipes to be distributed in the parish has been resolved with the intervention of Water Minister Dr. Karl Blythe.
It took more than a year for the pipes to arrive and this prompted a heated debate two months ago during a meeting of the St. Elizabeth Parish Council. At that meeting, People's National Party Councillor for the Balaclava Division, Rodney Barnes, called for the resignation of the Water Minister on the basis that he had misled the Council about the arrival of the pipes.
According to secretary/manager of the St. Elizabeth Parish Council, Opal Beharie, the Minister had now informed the agency that Keith Harris, district manager of the National Water Commission (NWC), is responsible for the distribution of the two-inch pipes which were promised to all 15 Divisions in the parish.
Mrs. Beharie told councillors and officers at the monthly meeting of the Council on December 13 that Mr. Blythe had asked that all concerns about the pipes be conveyed to the NWC district manager and that he should be contacted if the Council was having problems with the distribution process.
Councillor for the Southfield division, Shirley Myers, said he was happy that the Minister had designated someone at the local level to whom the Councillors could directly relate in the distribution of the pipes.
"For some time we have been hearing about these two-inch pipes and that they are to be distributed to all 15 Councillors for their divisions. It's time we start seeing some action," Mr. Myers said.
