Morant Bay Mayor Urges Gov’t Agencies to Attend Monthly Council Meetings

In an effort to encourage representatives of Government agencies to attend monthly meetings of the St. Thomas Parish Council, Mayor of Morant Bay, Hanif Brown, said he is considering videotaping them for cable television.
Speaking at the Council meeting held on Thursday (January 8), Mayor Brown said the footage would be shown on cable television to highlight the work of the Council and its effect on community development. The names of agencies that did not attend the meeting would also be highlighted, he said.
In light of the demand for improved services by citizens and plans for Councils to have autonomous status by September this year, the Mayor said it was critical for the agencies to attend the meetings so as to give updates on their activities in the parish, and to respond to questions from Councillors.
Mayor Brown was responding to concerns raised by the newly appointed Secretary/Manager of the Council, Fay Neufvlle about the poor attendance of some officers at Council meetings.
While not mentioning the delinquent agencies, the Mayor said that the Council would be sending out letters to those agencies whose representatives have not been attending meetings.
“They serve the public and they must come, and until stringent actions are developed whereby Managers know that sanctions would be applied, it won’t get better,” he said.
He said the Council would seek to find out what measures could be taken against officers for failure to attend the meetings.
The Mayor noted that there were other meetings, including the Infrastructure Development and Maintenance Committee, the Physical Planning Committee and the Parish Disaster Mitigation Planning and Response Management committee meetings, which agency representatives were asked to attend, but the Council meeting was the most important one.
The meetings are held on the second Thursday of each month at the Council’s meeting room on the grounds of the St. Thomas Infirmary in Morant Bay.