IN WAKE of protest action from the booted Merriman Mall vendors, President David Granger has said that vendors must be provided with suitable spaces to operate, but the City Council must also be able to enforce the city by-laws.

Responding to a question posed by National Communications Network (NCN) journalist Onicka Jones during a televised recording of “The Public Interest”, the President said: “The City Council has responsibilities. It has by-laws and regulations. I have been advised that the Town Clerk actually had meetings with the vendors. Warnings were actually given months ago.”

It is understood that a change in location can affect the vendors’ livelihoods, so the President said the City Council must put arrangements in place to ensure that those displaced are given accommodation at appropriate locations to ply their trade.

“There is a large vending population in Georgetown, and we must accept that. Some people prefer to buy from vendors, but vendors must conform to the laws. They must not leave debris and rubbish [scattered on the ground], and they must not go into prohibited areas. The City Council must provide areas for them, and they must abide by the municipality regulations,” the President said.

NON-ADHERENCE
In an invited comment, Town Clerk Royston King said that City Council was forced to temporarily suspend vending in that section of the Merriman Mall between Cummings Street and Orange Walk because vendors were not adhering to guidelines in regard to waste disposal and other guidelines that had been communicated to them last November.

“We told them that their stalls should be made to a specific height, colour and size; that they should have appropriately covered receptacles to dispose of their garbage in an environmentally-friendly way; that they should not drop their waste into the North Road or Church Street canals; that they should not park their vehicles on that stretch…and the area should be left clean at the end of the day. That was not adhered to, and so, out of an abundance of concern, we suspended vending so that we can clean the environment,” King said.

However, a temporary area on the Mall, between Cummings and Light Streets, has been identified for vendors to operate while the council evaluates their operations to ensure that it falls in line with city by-laws. The area where vending has been temporarily suspended will be cleaned, and based on the vendors’ adherence to guidelines, a decision will be made on whether they can return to that location.

King said, “They are providing a valuable service to the people, [for] which we are grateful. Also, they have a right to make a livelihood. …the intention is…to strike a balance between their rights to make a livelihood and our responsibility to deliver a clean and healthy environment….” During this time, King said, the council would fabricate the stalls and install receptacles and other facilities that would allow those vendors to ply their trade in a way that would not offend the aesthetics of the environment or compromise the health of the communities that are contiguous to that stretch.