NSWMA chided by councillors for not removing derelict vehicles
Published:Saturday | January 14, 2023 | 12:53 AMBryan Miller/Gleaner Writer
WESTERN BUREAU:
THE NATIONAL Solid Waste Management Authority (NSWMA)/Western Parks and Markets (WPM) is being lambasted by councillors in the Hanover Municipal Corporation (HMC), and residents of the parish, for its lack of action towards removing derelict vehicles from the side of roads across the parish.
Mayor of Lucea and chairman of the HMC, Sheridan Samuels, highlighted the problem at Thursday’s HMC monthly meeting, claiming that he has made several reports for months now to the WPM, but has not received a response from the agency.
While the NSWMA/WPM was commended for its efforts at clearing the backlog of garbage across Hanover, it’s public cleansing inspector for eastern Hanover, Andrew Walker, appealed for assistance from the HMC, its councillors and the Hanover Public Health Department, to implement a public education campaign addressing the proper disposal of bulk waste.
But Samuels reminded Walker that the HMC had asked the WPM to clear bulk waste within the parish, especially derelict vehicles.
“We (HMC) had reported to you (NSWMA/WPM) that there are some derelict vehicles in Johnson Town, Malcolm Heights, Haughton Court, Miller’s Drive and other areas, and to date nothing has been done about them, they are all still sitting at the side of the roads wreaking havoc,” Samuels pointed out.
He said that the area of Malcolm Heights is now being used to take some of the vehicular traffic off main street Lucea, with a view to minimising the traffic congestion in that town, adding that derelict vehicles along that roadway, which have been reported to the cleaning agencies on several occasions, are still sitting there and creating a hazard.
Accident risk
Superintendent of police in charge of Hanover, Sharon Beeput, told the meeting that a defective vehicle that has been left along the main road on entering Hopewell could cause an accident if it is not removed soon, as it is positioned “in a double corner”.
While not giving a specific timeline when the vehicles would be removed, Walker told The Gleaner that he would make every effort to fix the problem.
“Once they are reported to us, our enforcement team will visit the locations named, and if the vehicles are seen we will go ahead and place a tag on them, giving the owners a prescribed time within which to remove those vehicles. If the owners do not comply then our agency will go ahead and remove those vehicles once our crane truck is working,” he stated.
He said that the crane truck attached to the NSWMA/WPM has been inoperable for sometime now, and that could be the reason why the concerns in Hanover have not been addressed.