WE THINK it is out of place for the Prime Minister of Jamaica to find it necessary to tell the town of Ocho Rios to clean up its garbage. That we think is primarily the business of the Parish Council of St. Ann which ought to administer the function of public cleansing, the traditional responsibility of the local authorities.
The fact that Mr. Patterson in making such an appeal over last weekend was echoing a similar call from Mayor Delroy Giscombe of St. Ann's Bay means that municipal administration remains ineffectual either from lack of resources or the will to get things done.
This gives point to the call from JLP chairman Bruce Golding for more clarity between the roles of Parish Councils and the Central Government. Clarification of the roles is now more pertinent in the political reality that has followed the massive JLP victory in the last Local Government elections. Having won control of 12 of 13 Parish Councils the opposition party may be hard put to run the councils while the ruling PNP maintains control of Central Government.
This situation is therefore ripe for strategic manoeuvring with political objectives in mind. But that, we submit, should not take precedence when other considerations are at stake. In this instance Ocho Rios as an important resort town should not become so untidy that it needs the urging of the Prime Minister himself to appeal for a general clean-up.
The fact that the appeal was also directed at the business community suggests that the resources available from Central Government are either inadequate or are not being made available.
We note that even in the new municipality of Portmore, Mayor George Lee has pleaded for more resources and staffing to give effect to projects in what is presumably a model of where local governance is expected to go.
If St. Ann and St. Catherine are examples of what still ails local government we wonder if the Prime Minister intends to mount an islandwide campaign to give a boost to parochial business. We hope not. The local authorities must do their job and the Ministry of Local Government must support them. Maintaining public cleanliness is the most basic of parochial responsibilities.
THE OPINIONS ON THIS PAGE, EXCEPT FOR THE ABOVE, DO NOT NECESSARILY REFLECT THE VIEWS OF THE GLEANER.
