By Telesha Ramnarine

CITY Hall officials and all city councillors will meet tomorrow to determine a permanent place to relocate displaced Stabroek Market vendors.In the meantime, some 133 of the approximately 150 displaced vendors have been offered temporary relocation south of Public Buildings in the City.

Mayor Patricia Chase-Green is urging those vendors who own stalls in various markets and other locations to return to those stalls and give others a chance to be relocated. According to her, many of these vendors have stalls at various locations, including at the Vendor’s Arcade, La Penitence Market, Albouystown Market, Stelling View Market, and Bourda Market.

“Within that 150 that we would have moved, there are vendors who have stalls along the streets. So one owner has different stations, which is unfair, and they still have their stall in the market,” Chase-Green observed.

Speaking with the Chronicle on the sidelines of the council’s fortnightly statutory meeting at City Hall, Chase-Green said those individuals are expected to go back to their original stalls.

“They will not be given spaces under the new location; it’s for those who never owned a stall.”
The mayor said City Council is working closely with the Ministry of Infrastructure to find a long-term solution to the current vending issue.

“We just couldn’t be shifting people all the time. So when they are moved after the three months, they will be moved to the permanent location,” she explained.

Public Relations Officer Debra Lewis told this newspaper, following the statutory meeting, that among the places City Hall is thinking of relocating the minibus parks are at Industrial Site, North Cummingsburg and Kingston.
Although no definite decision has been made, using these locations will definitely ease congestion in the city, Lewis observed.

The Stabroek Market vendors are so far unsure for how long they will be permitted to vend at the new location on Hadfield Street. They have been told by City Hall officials only that an agreement was made with the owner of the spot for them to remain there for three months. The vendors have no clue what their fate will be after this time.

Some are wondering if they will be made to endure the current disaster of transition all over again, or if they will settle in and become comfortable at the new spot, only to have to leave it shortly afterwards.

As it is, no specific details have been offered to the sellers, and many of them are simply guessing their way through; or, as one woman said on Sunday afternoon, “We just have to follow the multitude.”

Having vended outside Stabroek Market for 16 years now, one vendor said if the City Council wanted to move them, they could have made proper arrangements to have them relocated, and provide to them specific details on how long they were going to be temporarily removed.

“They just gave us a couple days’ notice to move. You are leaving us out of business. It shows me that this was not properly planned; because if you wanted us to move, you would have prepared the place so we could have had a smooth transition,” the woman complained.

Vendors have, through protests and other means, recently voiced their concern that the new site will kill their businesses. Many of them told this newspaper on Sunday that they have opted to conduct business mainly between the hours of 06:00 hrs and 18:00 hrs because of security reasons.

City Hall said recently that it is not seeking to put stakeholders out of business, but is seeking to ensure that vending is done in a conducive and legitimate atmosphere that is mutually beneficial to stakeholders and City Council.

Georgetown Deputy Mayor Sherod Duncan mentioned to this newspaper that the move by City Hall to re-organise the Stabroek Market Bazaar is perhaps the single largest undertaking in that vicinity since the market was constructed in 1881.