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Deliberations continue ahead of unveiling of City Budget
As the presentation of the Georgetown municipality budget draws near, heads of the various departments under the leadership of Mr Keith Burrowes, continued deliberations yesterday geared at ensuring the municipal financial plan for this year will be feasible.
The forum in session yesterday
The heads, who were drawn from the Finance, Personnel and Training Committees, were able to defend proposed spending in their respective departments even as some adjustments were made. Some members of the Council were also in attendance.
According to Deputy Mayor and Chairman of the Finance Committee, Robert Williams, who was performing the duties of Mayor yesterday, the meeting was merely another attempt to address some of the burning issues relating to the management of the delivery of services to the citizens of Georgetown.
He noted that the municipality recognises the need to address the core services for which the citizens who pay taxes expect results. The importance of programme planning and facilitating measures implemented in a modern way by means of technology that will help to guide the municipal operations have also been recognised, Williams added.
And according to him, “the involvement of Mr Burrowes is one which we accepted and which we are happy about because he was the person who conducted the Commission of Inquiry and has hands on knowledge of what some of these recommendations entail. He is in a position to give us necessary advice.”
Following the extensive deliberations which have been ongoing for some weeks now, the next phase will be to place the entire budget proposal before full council in order to get its approval before releasing it to the public. The public he said will be able to scrutinise the budget and hold Council accountable when activities are not delivered on.
But according to Burrowes, critical to the process engaged yesterday was the need for results. According to him, once the budget is finalised and circulated it will identify tangible qualitative and quantitative indicators which could be reflected on and measured.
He highlighted that the way in which the budget was done in previous years revolves around the anticipated resources that are available. “So if the Treasurer indicates that there is a revenue strain then we would go back and cut to match it with revenue.
“The approach this year is a little different. The approach is to set the benchmarks as to what you want to do and what you have to do, based on your statutory requirements.”
And some indicators have been outlined detailing what the council would want to achieve this year. It has been discovered that the amount for cost is significantly higher than what was in the original budget. This, Burrowes attributed to at least two issues that were not examined in the past.
“The service provided in the public health care arena is heavily subsidised (but) because it is part of your delivery it has to be cost and put in the budget…There are several non-core such as the Day Care Centres which are not statutory requirements but you are subsiding that by about $80M annually,” Burrowes told the gathering.
“Because you are not including everything in this budget you don’t know to what extent your core activities are being subsided because you are subsidising this non-core activity.” Nonetheless, Burrowes noted that there still would remain a $200M gap where much focus would be required if funding is to be acquired. And it is very crucial that attempts be made to ensure that funding is secured to bridge the gap.
Commencing with a presentation by Head of the Information Technology Department, Mr Waynewright Orderson, the deliberations marked another successful engagement with Burrowes.
During a recent interview with the Deputy Mayor, he revealed that the budget for this year will focus primarily on the recommendations outlined in the Burrowes Report. As Chairman of the Finance Committee, Williams has the responsibility of presenting the budget, a move he believes will be realised on Monday.
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