City Hall continues to befuddle

Nov 21, 2017 Letters

DEAR EDITOR,
I note, with a wry smile, the letter from Shanta Singh in Kaieteur News (Monday, November 20, 2017) with the headline: “Something has to be wrong at City Hall.”
Shanta Singh, giving explanations in each case, suggests seven instances where “something has to be wrong.” These include “the workers of the Georgetown Municipality; the councillors who, except for a few, sit meekly around the horseshoe table; the Legal Affairs Committee; the Government; the private sector; the citizens of Georgetown; the City Council”.
This morning a General Rate Demand Notice 2017 from the Mayor and Councillors of the City of Georgetown was hand-delivered at my home, and I signed for it. Among other things it increased my rate percent, indicated how much the demand for 2017 would be, charged me $27 as interest as at November 7, 2017 and warned me that interest on arrears will be recalculated and applied on the date of payment.
I had to laugh out loud.
Every single year I turn up at City Hall at 07:45 hrs on the first working day of the year. Although I walk with the computer printout receipt for the payment made for the previous year, I steadfastly refuse all offers of a handwritten receipt from a book, and I wait patiently until a cashier’s computer is up and running, so that I can pay and get a printed receipt.
I must have a black spot at the end of my tongue because, lo and behold, the Demand Notice 2017 that I received today boldly states as “Payments to Date” a sum that is far less than the sum recorded on the printed receipt I was given when I duly made payment on 03 January, 2017. Has that computer disappeared?
I do not know whether other rates and taxes payers have a similar experience.
Could I, with respect, please, piggy back on Shanta Singh’s letter and add an eighth item: “The Treasurer’s Office, City Hall, Regent Street, Georgetown?”
And could I – again with respect – ask whether when DEM BOYS SEH uses the term “Town Clown”, he means singular or he means plural? Is his term applicable elsewhere at City Hall?
George N. Cave

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