Claudia Gardner, Gleaner Writer

Lucea, Hanover:

Local Government Minister Dean Peart has summoned Mayor of Lucea and chairman of the Hanover Parish Council, Lester Crooks, to a meeting this Wednesday to discuss his company's contract with the developers of the Fiesta hotel in Lucea.

In a letter addressed to the mayor and copied to the secretary/ manager of the council, Alfred Graham, Mr. Peart said he was concerned that the mayor's involvement with the hotel poses a conflict of interest.

This revelation was made by Mr. Graham during the regular monthly meeting of the council on Thursday. Mr. Graham said he had received instructions from Minister Peart to read the letter to the meeting.

Conflict of interest

"This office has been made aware of certain allegations regarding your involvement, whether directly or indirectly, as a contractor employed to the Fiesta Hotel Group in Hanover," the minister said in the letter. "As you are aware this would be a conflict of interest in-so-far as you are mayor and chairman of the Hanover Parish Council which is both the local planning and building authority for the parish. It is imperative that you discuss areas of potential conflict to the council as doing otherwise would be contrary to the principles of transparency and good governance which the council is expected to uphold."

Mr. Graham read the letter following a statement made by Mayor Crooks that he has a building contract with the developers of the 1,600-room Fiesta hotel at Point Estate in Lucea.

Mayor Crooks had said earlier that residents in the parish have "been speculating about his involvement with the Fiesta developers". He said as a result, he was asking the council's permission to not participate in future discussions pertaining to Fiesta.

But the councillors rejected the mayor's request.

Councillor of the Cauldwell division, Sheridan Samuels, told the mayor that if he wanted to opt out of discussions regarding the hotel, it would be best if he first resign as chairman of the council.

"If you are going to take a stand like this, remember there are a lot of other issues that have been voted on in relation to Fiesta and so we would have to revisit all the other issues and you sit out of those discussions," Councillor Samuels said. "You are saying that your presence might influence certain things, that means your presence already influenced things when we did not know that you had a contract there!"