Before the collapse of the administration of the City of Georgetown, which occurred after Independence in 1966, Georgetown used to be famous worldwide as “The Garden City of the West Indies”. It was a well-merited appellation: The City’s streets were clean with flowering or ornamental trees such as flamboyants and royal palms planted on either side; the drains were kept in good order; the city’s canals were always in full flow to the River; the Le Repentir cemetery resembled a well-kept park, and the city’s administration was efficient and honest. Of particular note is that no garbage could be seen in the city since all solid waste was removed every day. The story of solid waste disposal from the city is an interesting one.

In the early 19th century, when the city was very small and had no more than 10,000 inhabitants, residents either buried their garbage or burnt it in their backyards. Towards the end of the 19th century, the population had grown considerably, and the City Council or Town Council as it was called, assumed its legal responsibility of disposing of the city’s garbage. Thomas Flood, a man with a fleet of animal-drawn carts that transported goods and building materials for the city and surrounding areas, was given the contract for rubbish collection and disposal. Flood had special carts built with high sides and covers and his men efficiently removed the city’s garbage for a dump on the East Bank. Thomas Flood, who was an orphan, was one of Guyana’s most creative 19th and early 20th-century entrepreneurs. It should be remembered that until the 1950s, there were few motor cars and motorised transport and horse and donkey carts and horse-drawn cabs provided the service which motor cars, motorbikes and lorries do today.

The city’s population continued to grow, and the City Council or Town Council, as it was then called, established a Waste Management Department with an office in the cemetery west of the Louisa Row gate. They also constructed an incinerator to incinerate the city’s rubbish. This incinerator was also placed in the cemetery in the jib at Princes and St Stephen’s Streets.
The city bought a fleet of three sturdy rubbish dump trucks that collected and disposed of the garbage at the incinerator. The streets and parapets were kept clean since there were crews which weeded the parapets and swept animal dung from the streets.

After Independence, the City Council and the city’s administration became politicised, which was the genesis of the city’s collapse. The rubbish dump trucks were never maintained and eventually became unserviceable and garbage piled up in the city. To bring a modicum of relief, the areas at the head of streets were boxed around and citizens deposited their rubbish there. In the 1980’s a few private contractors began to be employed and though these functioned irregularly, they brought some minor relief to the citizens.
In the early 1990s, the central government became democratised and began to reform the finances of the country and though the City Hall still remained in its old mould, two organised garbage companies, Pooran Bros and Cevons, were engaged by the Council and they performed creditably.

The City Council, however, soon drifted back into its old ways and began to owe these companies large sums of money until they found it impossible to continue, resulting in garbage piling up all over the city. The citizens began to complain and the Government was constrained to pay the contractors and garbage removal resumed.

In the meantime, when higher houses began to be built in Albouystown and Charlestown, the ash from the incinerator began to affect them and the Council was compelled to remove the incinerator. They tried to place it on the river bank parallel to lower Lombard Street, believing that the ash and smoke would dissipate over the river. This was found to be unworkable and the incinerator was dismantled and the city’s waste resumed being dumped in the East Bank dump site.

Unfortunately, the City Hall kept owing Pooran Bros and Cevons and from time to time, these companies had to discontinue work until the Central Government which was more financially solvent than in the 1980s, paid them. The companies had made large investments in equipment to be able to service the municipalities, so they could not disengage from their municipal customers. Accordingly, many citizens began to feel that the city’s garbage disposal was the responsibility of the Central Government. The responsibility of the City Council for garbage disposal from the city must be fully grasped since if there is any semblance of an assumption in City Hall that the Central Government has some responsibility for garbage disposal, it will be an inhibition on their doing their duty.

This weird assumption that M&CC has no responsibility for solid waste disposal from the city even exists among members of the City Council: Recently, Mr Travis Ellis, a City Councilor, accused the Central Government of not performing the M&CC”s waste management duties! (Guyana Chronicle 12/07/23).

As a first-aid to this situation, we would suggest, firstly, that the Mayor and Councillors and the Managers of the various departments of the City’s Administration study the Act establishing Georgetown and its amendments with help from the Attorney General’s Chambers; and secondly, that the City Treasurer’s Department be made to study the Financial Regulations the help of the Ministry of Finance. If these first-aid measures were taken, the efficiency of the City’s Administration would improve and its financial management would become transparent.