Hard choices rather than money is the key to City Hall’s revival

Aug 11, 2023 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom

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Kaieteur News – City Hall is now said to be cash-strapped. But this has been the City’s state of affairs for decades. Its revenue streams are insufficient to finance a city which has changed drastically over the past 50 years. But unfortunately that change has been for the worse.

For the greater part of those 50 years, City Hall has languished in the grip of an unending financial crisis. This situation is not helped by weak systems of financial and a managerial accountability which make it impossible for the government to offer a bail-out package to the Council.

The first step toward resurrecting City Hall from its financial abyss is to establish strong systems off financial and administrative accountability. The new Council cannot continue to operate as before. It has to take steps, and do so urgently, to ensure that every penny is used judiciously and transparently. This would represent an act of good faith.

Without this type of overhaul, no amount of financial infusion will yield the desired outcomes. A fresh, accountable start is the key to give a new lease on life to City Hall.

However, the challenges that beset Georgetown are not limited to financial and managerial accountability. The revenue system at City Hall needs to be made more equitable. The reality which both sides of the horseshoe table scrupulously avoid is that the burden of financing the city has fallen disproportionately on the shoulders of businesses.

A comprehensive reevaluation of how the City’s financial burden is shared needs to be undertaken.  A fair and equitable sharing of the revenue base of the City is necessary to correct the present imbalances.

Businesses carry a disproportionate share of City Hall’s revenue. They pay the bulk of the taxes in the City while residential properties pay rates that hardly can meet the costs of the services they receive, substandard as these services are.

Rates and taxes have to be realistic. But the government has boxed itself into an inflexible posture because of its local government election campaign promise of not raising rates and taxes.

Illegal vending has cast a shadow over the City’s markets and businesses. The inside of our markets are now like ghosts towns with numerous abandoned stalls. It’s a bitter irony that those who contribute their fair share – the legal vendors within the market – are suffocated by those operating outside the bounds of legality. Illegal vending is the culprit because shoppers no longer have to enter the markets to get items; everything is now available on the pavements and roadsides.

Most of the markets should have long been condemned and closed for poor sanitation. Going into a toilet in one of the City’s markets is like going into a gas chamber. And the drains outside most of the markets are stink and filthy. Even the gutter rats are afraid of falling in these drains.

Addressing the pressing issues of the City requires nothing short of a comprehensive, holistic approach. Georgetown needs a multidimensional strategy that not only mitigates its problems but eradicates them at their roots. This requires the political will, to confront these bugbears head-on. Dodging the challenges of squatting and illegal vending is no longer an option.

The path to rejuvenated city requires hard decisions. The illegal vendors and the squatters have to go.  Then there is need for a system of service charges to be introduced for residential properties. These services must be based on the cost of the service provided. The same needs to be done for drainage and street lights. Other rates and taxes should be calculated on the basis of size and with different rates for different wards. Ad valorem rates should be scrapped.

The management of the City needs to be overhauled. This requires streamlining the bureaucratic processes. No one should have to line up and wait hours to pay their rates and taxes. Sub-offices for revenue collection should be opened at the Post Offices where people can go and quickly pay their rates and taxes.

The challenges facing City Hall are daunting, but not insurmountable. By making hard choices, Georgetown can be restored to its former glory.

But the hard choices which have to be made requires political consensus. The two main political parties that dominate City Hall have to work out a modus vivendi in order to be able to make the bold and brave decisions needed to relive the crisis at City Hall.

All the finances in the Treasury will not help unless there is this political consensus. This is why entities such as the Private Sector should act as a good officer in trying to bridge the political divide around the horseshoe table and to bring the sides together for a joint plan of action to rescue the City.

(The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions and beliefs of this newspaper and its affiliates.)

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• City Hall, Council, Peeping Tom, revenue, revival

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