… waste disposal companies call on gov’t to help end standoff with City Hall

WASTE disposal companies, Cevons Waste Management Inc. and Puran Brothers Inc. said they will not make any rash decisions even as they call on government to intervene to bring an end to the impasse between them and City Hall.
After failing to pay the companies over $300M for services provided from 2015-2017, the Georgetown Mayor and City Council abruptly terminated their five-year contracts on August 5, 2017 and hired three smaller contractors to clean the city. City Hall’s failure to pay the companies has taken a toll on them, Cevons Waste Management Inc. Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Morse Archer and Puran Brothers Inc. General Manager, Kaleshwar Puran complained on Wednesday during an interview with the Guyana Chronicle.
After providing services to City Hall for 30 years, Puran said it saddens his heart to know it has taken a decision to terminate its contractor, not because the company had erred in any particular way but because it stood up for the millions of dollars owed by the Council for services already provided. Both companies had written to City Hall on August 2 indicating that all services will be suspended from August 6 until a substantial amount of monies owed are paid and an agreement reached for future payments. But instead of trying to resolve the issue with the contractors, City Hall wrote them on August 5, indicating that their services were no longer needed. According to Puran, City Hall’s failure to make early payments have crippled the operations of both companies, and it was on that basis that a decision was made to suspend their services until payments are made. City Hall reportedly owes Cevons Waste Management approximately $198M and Puran Brothers $174M.
“Our company is heavily indebted to the bank. Literally we have cheques turning back from the bank,” Puran pointed out while emphasizing that Puran Brothers is currently in a “serious financial jam.” “It is not easy for us,” he added.
Puran Brothers General Manager said as a result of the recent developments, the companies wrote a joint letter to President David Granger on August 7, 2017 requesting government’s intervention.

“We wrote the President on Monday trying to find a way out…we don’t want to make any rash decision. We have a passion for solid waste management and we want to continue on that note, but at this point we need somebody to sit down with us and render some assistance,” he said.
Archer, who also expressed his disappointment in the manner in which City Hall dealt with the matter, said for 20 years Cevons Waste Management has been providing its service to City Hall and this is the first time a contract was actually terminated. Archer noted that City Hall has often experienced financial difficulties which would have forced the companies to take industrial actions. According to the contract signed in 2015, City Hall is expected to make payments for services provided within 90 days but it has never fulfilled that obligation.

In the past, he said the companies would have given them a six-month period to issue payments before any decision was taken to suspend the services provided. To prevent a pile up of garbage, an agreement would be brokered and the companies would return to the streets. “We have put numerous arrangements in place so as to reach the payment. But each time these commitments, these plans are always broken,” Archer said while pointing out that it is usually a challenge to engage the Council.
With outstanding monies from 2015, 2016 and part of 2017, Cevons Waste Management and Puran Brothers met with officials from the council in March 2017 with the hope of having payments issued. At that time, City Hall proposed that the contractors “put on ice” the monies for 2015 and 2016, but this was rejected on the grounds that the companies had invested heavily in their operations to fulfill their contractual obligation.
“Regarding 2017, they give us a written undertaking that they will pay us on a monthly basis. This agreement was brokered on March 24, and whereby at the end of March month they would have paid us for January, end of April they would have paid us for February, and at the end of May month, they would have paid us for March and so on,” Cevons CEO explained.

But he said despite promising to make good on this written agreement, the Council again lapsed in its payments. At the end of March, the Council was unable to pay the sums owed; however, cheques were issued in the first week of April for services provided in January, 2017.
“In the first week of April, we got a cheque from them, went into the bank, the cheque was bounced. So we had to wait a period of time before the cheque was cleared,” Archer disclosed. Only a sum of $16M was paid to Cevons for January, 2017. The money was reportedly short by $1M.
“So we have three problems: the cheque was late, it was bounced and the amount was short,” Archer further pointed out.

Archer said to his surprise the same issue reoccurred in April and May. “The next payment was supposed to be for April month end for February, and the exact thing happened–the cheque was late, it was bounced and the amount was short.”
In June a payment was expected for April but several calls to the Council went unnoticed. As a result, Archer said during the first week of July, the companies indicated that they would suspend their services, and it was then that they were called into a meeting by City Hall.

During that meeting, the contractors were informed that payments for June could not have been paid because the Council’s Senior Staff had to be paid their travelling allowance.
“We said well look we don’t have money either to work,” Archer recalled. As a result, he said Cevons and Puran issued a joint statement indicating that they will be withdrawing their services until payments are made. In response, Council said they would not have engaged the Council until the contractors returned to work.
“We went back to work on June 12…and we tried numerous times to engage them. While on strike we had indicated to the President what had happened. We kept asking them to have a meeting,” Archer said.
On July 21, the contractors were informed of a meeting set for July 26 at 14:00hrs, but it was subsequently cancelled. They had met with Minister of Communities, Ronald Bulkan on July 24 and were to return on July 28 following the meeting with the Council on the 28th. “That never happened,” Archer posited.

On August 4 a meeting was held with the contractors and City Hall but the Council during that meeting indicated that it would pay $3M on the amounts it had fallen short of for January, February and March, and at the end of August, payments would have been issued for June.
“So we said to them that it can’t work, they got to do better than that,” Archer said. He also refuted the claims made by Mayor Patricia Chase Green that they wanted the Council to pay $300M before they return to work.
“It is being said that we are saying $300M or nothing; $300M was not discussed at that meeting, it never came up at that meeting,” Archer maintained.
On August 5, the Council terminated their contracts.