A small group of Bourda market vendors with whom Stabroek Business met at their request have said that the Georgetown City Council is not playing fair as far as providing stallholders with the services which they should under the tenancy agreement. The Stallholders, most of whom are in the food retail business told this newspaper that given their own adherence to their tenancy agreements with the council, there were far too many occasions on which requests for repairs or renovation and various other services were denied. “They are short-changing us,” the stallholder who arranged the meeting with this newspaper but declined to be identified said.
The stallholders told Stabroek Business that the routine response to requests for services from the council was that there was no money with which to respond to those requests, pointing out that the question arises as to what happens to the monies paid to the Council for the rental of stalls.
Clerk of Markets Schulder Griffith has told this newspaper in at least two frank interviews that stallholders’ complaints about requests for services not being responded to in a timely manner by the municipality are “sometimes justifiable.” Some months ago Griffith told Stabroek Business that he believed that revenue collected from municipal markets was sufficient to meet the needs of the institutions but that given the cash-strapped state of the council the revenue collected from the markets had to be allocated to other areas of the council as well. According to Griffith, the council also has a special fund set aside for emergency responses to matters affecting the municipal markets but did not say in exactly which circumstances those funds were used.
According to the Bourda market vendors some of the primary problems affecting the market included vulnerability to theft and leakages that sometimes resulted in spoilage of goods during particularly bad weather. “The problem that we have is that council has a million and one problems right now and it does not seem as though they have time for us. We have protested in the past but we cannot protest forever. We have to make a living.”
Last year, rentals collected from Bourda market grossed more than $100m. However, this newspaper understands that the Office of the Clerk of Markets has little to do with the application of resources to projects. Griffith told Stabroek Business during a recent interview that one of the challenges which his office continued to face was the disappointment associated with the municipality’s failure to make funds available to finance projects for which they had planned. “It becomes frustrating when we plan and budget for things and nothing happens,” Griffith said.
Meanwhile, the stallholders with whom Stabroek Business met say they want the municipality to be more mindful of the role which the market plays in providing revenue for the Council. Bourda market houses 2,604 stalls, the largest number of stalls provided by any of the five municipal markets in the capital. Stabroek market houses 1,591 stalls while the Albouystown market houses 558 stalls.
