A week after government promised to aid in clearing the Mandela Avenue landfill, Solid Waste Director Hubert Urlin said yesterday that the assistance has been of great help.
Urlin, addressing the last statutory council meeting for the year yesterday, said three excavators were deployed to the landfill by the Ministry of Works to assist with the machinery that the council had on site to assist with the moving of garbage to the cell two area.
Also, the contractor Puran’s Brothers will assist in the construction of the road to allow access through Mandela Avenue end, Urlin told the council.
Later, Urlin told this newspaper that the assistance was of great help. A visit to the site later showed that the garbage littering the roadway into the dump was cleared and the bulldozers were pushing waste up the ramp to get it to cell two.
Clifton Douglas, an on-site official from the Solid Waste Department, said that the new machinery has helped a lot. He said that work has to be done around the clock to get the garbage situation under control.
When this newspaper visited the site, the machines were seen at work and garbage lining the access road was removed.
Last week Tuesday, ministers Robeson Benn and Kellawan Lall on a visit to the landfill announced that they will be intervening in fixing the problem at the facility and slammed the City Council for poor management.
At yesterday’s meeting, Councillor Florence Bourne, who resides in North East La Penitence, vented her dissatisfaction about the condition of the dumpsite. She said she held off protests when she learnt that the President had called for an intervention. “I believe that whoever is going to correct the situation, be it the council or the government, it has to be expedited. It’s causing a lot of disgrace on our city,” she said.
Bourne, who says that residents have grown “aggressive” in their complaints to her about the situation, added that she will mobilise residents and protest if the site is not closed next month.
She said that many residents have expressed their fears for their health, given the state of the site.
Bourne said she has been living in that area for over 50 years and the current state of the landfill is the worst that it has ever been. “It’s a disaster,” she declared.
Earlier in the statutory meeting, Councillor Patricia Chase-Green said it was time to stop talking and take to marching.
Meanwhile, there was some confusion among councillors over the specific role of the central government in the management of the site. PNCR councillor Ranwell Jordan, while kick-starting discussions on the site, said “It is my understanding that they will supply equipment and the council will pay…I want to know what is really going on?” He added, “How can we as a council that has no money, that can’t afford to upkeep the present contractors we have, how can they say to this council that they will have equipment to sort out the situation and we will have to pay?”
Adding to Jordan’s question were Deputy Mayor Robert Williams and Councillor Chase-Green, who were concerned about who now manages the dumpsite. Mayor Hamilton Green, meanwhile, explained that in October he and Williams had a meeting with ministers Lall of the Local Government and Benn of Works. “I made it clear that the nature of assistance needed was either money and/or machinery,” he said, while adding that Lall took the decision to take over the management of the dumpsite.
However, Minister Lall, when contacted by this newspaper for a response as to whether the ministries have taken over management of the site, stated, “The statutory obligation is with the City Council. We have recognised that they need help with the pile-up and we came in to assist.”
Lall insisted that they are not taking over the management of the dumpsite. Further, when asked if the council would have to pay for the additional equipment on site, he said that the ministries will be covering those expanses. “They [City Council] will have to continue with the expenses they currently have,” he explained.
When the question of management of the landfill was posed to Solid Waste Director Urlin, he said that “the ministry is providing us with assistance in the cleaning of the landfill.”
