St. Elizabeth Steps Up Disaster Readiness

St. Elizabeth is taking concrete steps to strengthen disaster preparedness as key stakeholders convened on Wednesday (June 3) at the Junction Guest House for a Recovery Readiness Assessment Framework Workshop.

The workshop produced a roadmap and final report to guide future planning, resilience-building, and recovery efforts across the parish known as Jamaica’s ‘breadbasket’.

The event was organised by the Ministry of Local Government and Community Development, in collaboration with the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNDRR) and the St. Elizabeth Municipal Corporation.

Senior Director for Hazard Mitigation and Risk Management in the Ministry, Patrick Watson, told JIS News that the exercise was designed to help stakeholders assess the parish’s current level of recovery readiness and pinpoint areas in need of improvement.

He noted that the information gathered during the discussions will be compiled into the final report by UNDRR and its consultants to guide St. Elizabeth’s future planning initiatives.

“The intention was to have the worst affected parishes looked at first. St. Elizabeth and Westmoreland were among the parishes worst affected by Hurricane Melissa. So, on Friday, June 5, we will be going to Westmoreland to have a similar intervention,” Mr. Watson outlined.

“We are also hoping that with the additional support from the UNDRR, we’ll be able to do all the Municipal Corporations, certainly St. James, Trelawny and Hanover… parishes that were also significantly impacted by the hurricane,” he added.

Mayor of Black River and Chairman of the St. Elizabeth Municipal Corporation, Councillor Richard Solomon, emphasised that the workshop was staged at a critical time, as Jamaica enters the 2026 Atlantic Hurricane Season.

He noted that the parish is focused, not only on disaster response, but also on ensuring that communities can recover more effectively and emerge stronger from future events.

Councillor Solomon pointed out that St. Elizabeth has been actively working since the hurricane to assess how it can rebuild stronger, with this workshop forming an integral part of that ongoing effort.

“So, this workshop [looked] at framework, strategies, how we can put the necessary pools together to ensure that, in the event that there’s any sort of disaster… not only a hurricane… we are better able, not only in terms of responding but also in terms of recovery,” he explained.

The event brought together representatives from government agencies, emergency services, utility providers, community groups, and development partners.

Among the participants were representatives from the Ministry of Labour and Social Security, the Jamaica Public Service Company, the National Works Agency, the Jamaica Constabulary Force, the Jamaica Fire Brigade, and the St. Elizabeth Health Department, along with community representatives and non-governmental organisations.

Manager of Resilient Infrastructure Recovery for Local Governments at the UNDRR, Christopher Lopez Maciel, stated that the ultimate goal is to equip local parishes with the tools and organisational knowledge to “build back better” and achieve “recovery readiness” after a disaster.

“The UNDRR is working to support countries in the accomplishment of a framework that has four areas – improving risk knowledge, then working in the governance, then the financial muscle for reducing the risk and, lastly, the recovery readiness,” he underscored.