SPALDINGS, Clarendon:
RESIDENTS OF Ritches, Balcaress and adjoining communities in North West Clarendon are appealing to the National Water Commission (NWC) and the Clarendon Parish Council to assist them in easing the water shortage problem they have been expriencing for some time.
The residents say they have been experiencing water woes as a result of "a dry spell" which has resulted in very little or no rainfall over the period.
"We depend heavily on rainfall for water," one resident noted. "We have been having a dry spell and it has been killing us."
However, residents said that most of the water holes have gone dry, compounding the difficulty, they say, and which has forced them to be traveling several miles in search of water. This, they contend, has proven rather expensive, noting that they have had to be chartering taxis to transport water.
The residents said their plight has been reported to Councillor for the area Lloyd Francis who promised to seek help from the Parish Council and the NWC.
When Councillor Francis was contacted for comments he said he wrote to the Rapid Response unit in the NWC for assistance but was told that water could not be transported to the affected communities unless a payment was made.
He said the matter of water shortage in the communities was discussed at length at last month's sitting of the Clarendon Parish Council, where he made a suggestion for the Parish Council to allocate $50,000 from interest gained on a sum of money it had invested sometime ago.
However, according to Francis, the suggestion was brushed aside by PNP Councillors whom he said vigorously opposed the idea.
APPEAL
He has once again appealed to the Parish Council to take a look at his suggestion in an effort to assist the communities in alleviating their water woes.
The Councillor added that the Clarendon Parish Council was unable to effectively maintain minor water supplies, noting that a significant cut in the Council's budgetary allocation for its minor water supply programme makes it difficult.
He pointed out that prior to last year's allocation of $600,000 for Minor Water supply the budget was just over $2 million.
Last July, then Director of Finance at the Clarendon Parish Council Christopher Powell revealed that a budget of $185 million was submitted to the Ministry of Local Government to run the affairs of the Council. However, the sum allocated, he noted, showed a shortfall of $25 million.
