…council to install CCTV to catch culprits

MONEY garnered from the Kara Kara toll booth that kicked into operation last October has been of assistance to the Linden Mayor and Town Council, according to Mayor Carwyn Holland, but he continues to be concerned about alleged theft and will be moving soon to install Closed Circuit Television cameras to catch the culprits. Though an estimated figure was not given, Holland posited that the Council has been benefiting from the funds, as since then the Council has progressed in several ways — the most noted is the increase in workers’ salaries by 15%.
Holland however is contending that more could be done and the Council can earn more from the booth, if security measures are put in place to effectively monitor staff members attached to the facility. Already, two of the four persons who were employed by the Council have been fired for financial skulduggery and misappropriation of funds. Since then, two new employees have been hired, but there is still the belief by some employees of the Council, that fraudulent behaviour is continuing. While Holland did not deliberate on this conclusion made by some employees and some drivers who brought it to this publication’s attention under anonymity, he posited that the Council is looking at ways to tighten security as there are still loopholes. “Soon we should be fully secured with close circuit television (CCTV) as a means of monitoring and tightening up security,” Holland said.
He disclosed that some vigilant drivers and employees would have realised that the employees who have been fired, were involved in skulduggery and revealed same to the Council. An audit was done and it unearthed proof of fraud. One employee revealed to this publication that the toll booth employees would charge lumber trucks and heavy-duty machinery their correct toll, but would give the drivers a fake receipt, while documenting a toll received for a smaller vehicle which would incur a lesser amount. “They would collect money from a truck or so, but would write like if a bus or a car and then split up the money,” the employee said. The source also claimed that several employees may be working together to “get a draw back.”
Former Interim Management Committee Chairman, Orin Gordon, on Monday told the Guyana Chronicle that the former Council also had to deal with fraudulent behaviour before the toll booth was disbanded in 2013. Even though there was no concrete evidence against the employees there, the revenues garnered did not meet the expectations of the Council and therefore it was forced to collaborate with Community Policing Groups, who had ranks stationed at the toll booth. “We had tried our best to deal with that by ensuring that we had the community policing group assist us in the collection of the revenue…as soon as that happened, the revenues jumped up to three, four fold from what we were getting,” Gordon said. Unfortunately, Gordon said that the Council’s efforts were stymied and the Community Policing Groups were not rehired.
The Council was then faced with implementing several creative strategies to thwart any system of fraud that may be implemented by the employees. He expressed fear that the same thing is occurring now as he has been getting reports of questionable behaviour by persons living in proximity to the booth and so he advised the Council to put CCTV cameras in place earliest.
According to estimates, the toll booth should be raking in approximately $3M monthly or more than $36M on an annual basis. According to Mayor Holland, the revenues garnered cannot answer all of Linden’s economic problems, but will just “scratch the surface.” The revenues will assist with the repairing of roads and other infrastructure that have been destroyed as a result of the traversing of heavy-duty and lumber trucks, Holland pointed out at its launch in October.
The toll booth operations saw the imposition of tolls for use of the roads by 18 categories of vehicles, particularly vehicles passing through the town with fuel, lumber or merchandise. These include lumber trucks, machine haulers, container trucks, canters selling beverages, fish, fruits and vegetables, dry goods, etc. The tolls range from $2000 to $7000. Linden-registered businesses pay only 25% of the toll for their categories of vehicle.