–in bid to delay increase in container fees

GEORGETOWN Mayor Patricia Chase-Green has accused the Private Sector Commission (PSC) of deliberately refusing to meet with the City Council on the way forward regarding container fees.

“The private sector has no intention of meeting with us, in my opinion,” she said, adding that the Commission keeps requesting meetings on dates they know are days on which statutory meetings are held.

“The private sector is not interested in meeting with this Council or moving it forward in any way; two years now and the issue cannot be resolved. We’ve only been writing and writing and writing,” the Mayor complained.
Chase-Green said that if a meeting is not held between the two parties before the end of this month, the City Council will proceed to take a decision with regards to increasing the fees.

“Why is it that this Council has to bend to the private sector each time? she asked. “We started discussions on the issue, and suddenly it went off the road. But we must not hold much longer, because we’re continuing to see the deterioration of our roads.”
Big business owners are also continuing to take advantage of the City Council, Chase-Green observed, and thus closure ought to be brought to the matter.

Town Clerk Royston King pleaded with the Mayor to give the PSC another chance. “Let us give them the benefit of the doubt, and take it from the standpoint that they want to work with us,” he said.

BUSH TRUCKS

The Mayor also touched on the issue of huge fuel-laden bush trucks parked in front of people’s premises.

“We have to go after these trucks too,” the mayor said, adding: “As soon as we begin to talk about fees, you hear about another protest. There is a particular set in Georgetown which has difficulty every time the city wants to move forward.”
Chase-Green said the City Council should no longer allow these bush trucks to pass Agricola and enter Georgetown because of the amount of damage they are causing to city streets.

King rejoined that the parking meter project is expected to address these concerns. He said that while the trucks do pay for their road licences, its is not the Guyana Revenue Authority (GRA) that does road repairs.

Banks DIH, he noted, is one company which helps the City Council repair roads, especially those on which they operate frequently.
King had in the past urged Chase-Green to urgently pursue the container fee issue so that the $5000 being charged currently for each container leaving the wharf can be increased to a more reasonable amount.

“We need to settle this issue so we can get a definite figure. Five thousand dollars is not enough; we’re denying shippers the opportunity to make their full contribution to the city,” King had said. **

The City Council had said in the past that it wanted $8,000 in fees for a 20-foot container, and $10,000 for 40 or 45-foot ones. These new figures were part of a proposal being mulled by the tripartite committee consisting of the Council, the government, and the PSC.
Councillor Alfred Mentore had told councillors that the new amounts being requested by the M&CC are fair and reasonable.

Councillor Malcolm Ferreira had said: “People have to understand that a penalty is a penalty; it’s nothing you can just pick up US$12 or US$50 and pay off.
“They (businesses) could put it (their containers) on the road for 10 days and pull out $25,000 out their pocket easy, because they have $50M worth in the container,” he said.
City Hall had decided to implement a $25,000 container fee, but this attracted much flak from members of the business community and the PSC.

Some businessmen had also resorted to the courts, accusing the M&CC of illegally implementing such a fee. And, the courts had ruled in favour of the businessmen. City Hall has stressed, though, that money is needed to repair roads which the containers have been damaging over the years.