By Roy Sanford, Staff ReporterWESTERN BUREAU:
IMMEDIATE PAST president of the Montego Bay Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Mark Kerr-Jarrett blasted the Government for its lack of assistance to the Montego Bay based Good Shepherd Foundation.
The Good Shepherd Foundation runs the Hope Hospice, the only institution in western Jamaica that caters to the residential needs of sufferers of the deadly HIV/AIDS virus. According to Mr. Kerr-Jarrett it has been trying without success for the last four years, to receive tax-free status from the Government.
"It alarms me that the Good Shepherd Foundation has been trying for the last four years to get tax free status from the Ministry of Finance and it is yet to be granted," he stated during an opening ceremony of a new wing at the institution last weekend.
He appealed to the Minister of Finance, Dr. Omar Davies, to grant tax free status to the Foundation. "Or better still (Dr. Davies should) come first and see what the Lord is doing through this organisation to help those that are really the responsibilities of the Ministry of Health," he said.
He stated that the tax-free status would greatly assist the foundation. "It grieves me to hear that containers of supplies for this AIDS hospice and the Bishop's other charitable enterprises have to be returned to their foreign donors because Customs insists on levying import duties on them," he stated.
"This tax-free facility would increase the Good Shepherd Foundation's capacity to serve the community by soliciting greater assistance from the local business community through donations in cash and kind."
The Hope Hospice was founded by Most Rev. Charles Dufour, Bishop of the Catholic diocese of Montego Bay. It was opened in 1997 and has since hosted 350 persons with the virus. With the new wing, the Hope Hospice, which costs over $5 million to operate annually, now has eight bedrooms and 22 beds. The new wing costs $3.5 million.
