Councillors unhappy with habitual late start to HMC’s meetings

WESTERN BUREAU:

There was a moment of disagreement during last Thursday’s monthly meeting of the Hanover Municipal Corporation (HMC) as a councillor and the mayor came down on opposite sides of an argument about the habitual late start to both general and committee meetings.

Councillor Marvell Sewell, of the Green Island division, was quite vociferous in expressing his disgust about the practice which he said caused the meetings to go on for extended hours.

But Lucea mayor, Sheridan Samuels, countered that the HMC’s constitution does make provision for those occurrences.

“As long as they start before the one hour allotted within the Constitution,” said Samuels. He noted further that once the designated time has passed, the meeting is automatically cancelled.

Sewell, however, highlighted the long distance that he travels, and the effort to get to meetings on time, only to be told on arrival that there is not a quorum and the meeting has fallen through. He said that in other instances the meeting is called to order almost an hour after the agreed scheduled start time.

“When we went to the retreat in Negril (Ministry of Local Government, municipal corporation’s retreat), we decided that the meetings will start on time, and when I reach here on time for a 10 a.m. meeting, sometimes I have to wait until 10:55 before the meeting get started,” he said.

Samuels eventually conceded somewhat, noting that three members are enough to form a quorum in the seven-member HMC body, so no meeting should be falling through because of a lack of a quorum.

“All seven of us are on all sub-committees, except the Poor Relief, and, as such, we should not be having meetings falling through, as each committee has a chairman and a co-chairman. And those two persons should make every effort to be at meetings ... all is needed then is one more councillor to have a quorum,” said Samuels.

On the matter of the late start to meetings, Samuels argued however that there is a provision for lateness.

“The rule of law states that the meeting starts at 10 o’clock, (and) it can go up until 11 o’clock before it begins. After that, it falls through. We have to accept that. So, nothing is wrong with the late start,” said Samuels, albeit encouraging councillors to try to be on time.

Wynter McIntosh, the councillor for the Chester Castle division, shared that he travels at least 106 kilometres to attend meetings, and was also not comfortable with the late start to the meetings.

“I am normally one of the first to arrive for meetings and it is a concern to me, especially when I travel all that distance and there is not a quorum to hold the meeting,” he told The Gleaner following the meeting. “There is no way with seven councillors and three forming a quorum should any meeting fall through.”

With Sewell holding his position, and Samuels not making any further concession, it was agreed that there was a need for greater communication between councillors with a view to ensure that council meetings start on time.