–APNU Councillor stages protest against Town Clerk

By Telesha Ramnarine

CONSTITUENCY Six Councillor Andrea Marks yesterday staged a one-person protest at City Hall to show her disapproval of the manner in which Town Clerk Royston King suspended selling near the Bourda Market.

Holding two small placards aloft for the entire statutory meeting to see, Marks left no-one in doubt as to how she felt over the matter.One of the placards read: “Has Royston King take up from

where Sooba left off?”, the other simply said: “Royston King must go.”

King and his team had swooped down on vendors who ply their trade on Robb Street, between Alexander and Bourda Streets, last Saturday, and terminated the businesses that vendors were conducting on the basis of having to clean the area. Frustrated and angry, the vendors turned up at Councillor Marks’s home, quarreling and urging her to intervene.

Councillor Marks does not mind the City Council having to clean the area, but she is upset that the vendors had not been given prior notification. And that is why she did not mind being the only one to protest at yesterday’s statutory meeting. And neither did her hands grow weary, it seems, as she held her placards high from start to finish.

HURT
Asked how she felt about being the only councillor to do what she did, Marks said, “I have to do what I have to do, because I represent a large community. I need to keep my community together. If this is the way to comfort my people, then that’s it. That’s why I come here and picket today, because I am hurt and upset.”

Marks said that if she had been informed of the City Council’s decision to clean the said area, she would have ensured that she had warned some of the vendors there in good time, so as to save them from purchasing goods. Many of their items, including their fruits and vegetables, went to waste, she said, as she recalled how one vendor took her bananas to her house to show her the plight she was in.

“I woke up with two vendors in front of my gap; they were frustrated,” Marks said, adding: “My problem is I know the city has to clean, but let’s do it in the right way. You know you going on Saturday to clean Bourda Market, give these people a day notice. But if you turn up and they don’t obey, then you do what you have to do; I am in full support of that; people have to get time.”

“I have to do what I have to do, because I represent a large community; I need to keep my community together. If this is the way to comfort my people, then that’s it; that’s why I come here and picket today, because I am hurt and upset”
–City Councillor Andrea Marks

UNSANITARY CONDITIONS
But the Town Clerk is adamant that he took an administrative decision, and hence did not need to inform the mayor’s office. This is in response to Deputy Mayor Sherod Duncan’s complaint that King did not inform him of the move to suspend the vending.

Mayor Patricia Chase-Green had been out of the jurisdiction at the time of the incident.

King detailed that vending operations were suspended on the basis of environmental integrity, road safety, reduction of criminal activities, food safety, and public health.

“A visit to that area revealed that a number of the vendors were carrying out their activities in breach of the Municipal and District Councils Act as well as the Public Health Ordinance Chapter 145,” King said.

“Quite a few of the vendors were selling over stagnant, dirty drains in the vicinity of a defective sewerage system; and their produce — vegetables, fruits and other things — were stored on the ground just on a dirty old cloth. This is against the law. The law says three feet above ground,” he added.

He also contended that vendors were sprinkling their vegetables with water that had a terrible colour and smell. “We’re not sure where they got their water from,” King said. “They were also dumping in the vicinity where they were selling; and what was very disturbing was that they had a noticeable mini-dumpsite at the entrance of Mike’s Pharmacy.”

With regard to road safety, King said the vendors were encroaching on the roadways on both sides, and in spite of City Hall’s efforts, they continued to come out on the roadways, thereby preventing the smooth movement of traffic.
On a third point, the Town Clerk observed how, over the past few months, there has been an increase in criminal activities within that same vicinity.

SYMPATHETIC BUT UNYIELDING
Mayor Chase-Green has noted that the Town Clerk, as Chief Executive Officer, has a right to stop all works and transactions immediately if he finds any conditions that are unsanitary.

“We all know that the vendors at Bourda Market agreed that they will spend one day per month to have the area cleared and cleaned,” the mayor said, adding: “They did it (for) two months and stopped. There is a series of complaints from business people, where vendors have taken it upon themselves that they can occupy legitimate business premises from the entrances, starting as far as Alexander Street, from beyond the alleyway and going to where Continental paint company is; coming right down in front of the church, blocking legitimate businesses to the point where some of them are saying they have to close because there is no entrance or exit for customers.”

Chase-Green said the same vendors had a meeting at City Hall, after which they agreed to sell only at certain points and not block businesses in the area, and to operate in accordance with the public health laws.

“You cannot have for sale vegetables and foodstuff literally thrown all over the ground; where you have human faeces all over the place; the pigeons; water; overflowing drains; sewerage,” she said. “As to the irresponsible remarks made by the Deputy Mayor and others that the Town Clerk must go, must go on what basis? He closed off that section in the best interest of the city.

“We are sympathetic towards them, and we understand their need for selling, and that they have to care for their families; but must we allow them to sell in unhealthy conditions?” she asked rhetorically.