Nagra Plunkett, Staff ReporterWESTERN BUREAU:
THE NATIONAL Water Commission (NWC) has launched an aggressive collection drive to recover $280 million owed by customers in St. James.
NWC Area Manager for St. James and Trelawny, Mark Barnett, said a pragmatic approach was undertaken in the parish a week ago in a bid to get persons to settle their bills.
"We actually started in Rose Heights and Flankers with community meetings where we talk with residents and make payment arrangements with account holders. We also met with the councillors for the areas. The responses have been very good so we hope to see the difference and over time this method will be extended into other communities."
According to him, the communities of Flankers, Glendevon, Rose Heights, Liliput, Retirement/Granville and Norwood owe a significant amount of the arrears. They are also classified as 'red areas', that is, places where there is difficulty collecting payments because of socio-economic and violence problems.
Mr. Barnett, who took up office two months ago, mentioned that there were other factors contributing to the non-payment of bills in the parish such as the "general perception especially in rural areas that water is free".
He also added that some persons are reluctant to pay their bills until their services are disconnected, a practice that has been identified in Bogue Heights, St. James.
"We have to be cost efficient so we are seeking to reduce the cost incurred for carrying out disconnection exercises," explained the NWC Area Manager. "We are also going to use town criers in the different communities to get people to come in and settle their bills.. Even if it means going house-to-house, I am committed to doing that. Whatever it takes to bring the revenue in."
He noted that for the parish of Trelawny, which has 8,292 active accounts, the arrears figure amounted to $37 million.
