MoBay mayor says council to blame for improper planning

Claudia Gardner, Assignment Coordinator

WESTERN BUREAU:Montego Bay Mayor Glendon Harris says the St James Parish Council, which he chairs, should take most of the responsibility for the water-shortage problems being faced by new housing developments.

His comments came during the regular monthly meeting of the council after councillors Leroy Williams and Jason Cummings, of the Hendon/Norwood and Rose Hall divisions, respectively, said communities were facing serious water problems.

"Persons can't go to work, persons can't go to school," Williams said. "There is one report of a boy who had to go to school without his uniform because there was no water in the area for him to wash.

"The water problem has become a health issue. Persons have to be using the bathroom three and four times before it can flush. It is unacceptable. We have written to the ministry; we have written to the member of parliament. I don't know where next to turn," he said.

Cummings lamented that communities such as Rhyne Park, Spot Valley, Cornwall, Kingsgate, Rose Hill, and Rosevale were having a water-supply crisis. He said some housing developments in his division had taken place "without an expansion of the existing (water-supply) network".

"So it has been pressured, hence the pump in Rhyne Park was burnt up recently because it cannot manage the volume to meet the demand," Cummings said.

But the mayor, in his response, said the blame did not lay exclusively with developers or the National Water Commission as no project in the parish could be executed without obtaining permission from the St James Parish Council.

"So what you are saying is that the council is a contributing factor to the inconvenience that the residents are facing because we approved the development plan. Even though it was sent to the National Water Commission, we did not ensure that the necessary development of the amenities to go with the development was in place," Harris said.

"So the council is also at fault. And I am saying that to get to the point that as a council, that as the authority, to approve or disapprove these development plans, we go through every single factor. We want the development, but it can't be at any cost," the mayor said.