Minister Dean Peart

A proposal by Local Government Minister Dean Peart, to centralise engineers and technical experts into a single unit in the ministry is being met with opposition from parish councils.

During a recent Gleaner Editors' Forum, the minister proposed to centralise experts into a unit at the ministry and have them available to parish councils on request.

"Every parish council can't have that level of engineer inside, we cannot pay for it, so what we need to do is we need to centralise (that service) now (in order) to monitor it," Minister Peart said.

But Milton Brown, Mayor of May Pen and Chairman of the Association of Local Government Authorities (ALGA), opposes the proposal to centralise the project monitoring function. He counter proposes that each council be given its own technical staff so it can more effectively administer to the parish's development.

"I have a difficulty with that. I am not subscribing to any more centralisation of governance and this idea about building a unit in the Ministry, I think we have had a lot of that," argued Mayor Brown. "The Central Government has been holding on to the authorities, everything that happens in Local Government you have to get the Minister's approval," added Brown.

He is being supported by Mayor of Portmore George Lee and Mayor of Montego Bay, Noel Donaldson who both believe the institutional capacity of the councils were too weak and needed the addition of technical experts to make them more effective.

Expense of local authorities

According to Mayor Lee, while the minister was making an attempt to build the capacity of the ministry it was being done at the expense of the local authorities. He believes equipping the councils with experts will also cut some of the red tape currently frustrating the efforts of these bodies to develop their municipalities.

"I think what is needed at this time is for the councils to develop the capacity, or given the necessary help to acquire the necessary technical expertise that they could do some of the work that now goes to NEPA, and I think that would cut down the time.

That view is shared by Mayor Donaldson who noted that his council has had to go the route of ignoring the guidelines set by the Parish Council Services Commission to acquire the expertise they needed to build the capacity of the parish council.

"Despite our constant pleas and request for additional staffing it has been falling on deaf ears," he said.

Falmouth Mayor, Jonathan Bartley has gone a similar route and is also calling for more institutional support from the Ministry of Local Government.

"There are times when you need things to be done and then you have to wait on all this red tape," Mayor Bartley said. He suggested that hiring more experts at the local level will only improve the process of development and benefit the people of the parish.

Lack of training

Secretary Manager in the St. James Parish Council, Ian Reid points to yet another problem - insufficient training of staff to carry out there respective duties.

He said the Local Government Ministry and the services commission are responsible for training, but they have slacked up in that regard.

"So in terms of building institutional capacity we need to focus some more on that [training]," Mr. Reid said.

A proposal by Local Government Minister Dean Peart to centralise engineers and technical experts into a single unit in the ministry is being met with opposition from parish councils.

During a recentGleaner Editors' Forum, the minister proposed to centralise experts into a unit at the ministry and have them available to parish councils on request.

"Every parish council can't have that level of engineer inside, we cannot pay for it. So what we need to do is we need to centralise (that service) now (in order) to monitor it," Minister Peart said.

Opposes proposal

But Milton Brown, Mayor of May Pen and chairman of the Association of Local Government Authorities (ALGA), opposes the proposal.

He counterproposes that each council be given its own technical staff so it can more effectively administer the parish's development.

"I have a difficulty with that. I am not subscribing to any more centralisation of governance and this idea about building a unit in the ministry, I think we have had a lot of that," argued Mayor Brown. "The Central Government has been holding on to the authorities, everything that happens in Local Government you have to get the minister's approval," added Brown.

He is being supported by Mayor of Portmore, George Lee, and Mayor of Montego Bay, Noel Donaldson, who both believe the institutional capacity of the councils was too weak and needed the addition of technical experts to make them more effective.

Expense of local authorities

According to Mayor Lee, while the minister was making an attempt to build the capacity of the ministry, it was being done at the expense of the local authorities. He believes equipping the councils with experts will also cut some of the red tape currently frustrating the efforts of these bodies to develop their municipalities.

"I think what is needed at this time is for the councils to develop the capacity, or be given the necessary help to acquire the necessary technical expertise that they could do some of the work that now goes to NEPA, and I think that would cut down the time.

That view is shared by Mayor Donaldson, who noted that his council has had to go the route of ignoring the guidelines set by the Parish Council Services Commission to acquire the expertise they needed to build the capacity of the parish council.

"Despite our constant pleas and request for additional staffing, it has been falling on deaf ears," he said.

Lack of training

Falmouth Mayor, Jonathan Bartley, has gone a similar route and is also calling for more institutional support from the Ministry of Local Government.

"There are times when you need things to be done and then you have to wait on all this red tape," Mayor Bartley said. He suggested that hiring more experts at the local level will only improve the process of development and benefit the people of the parish.

Secretary/Manager in the St. James Parish Council, Ian Reid, points to yet another problem - insufficient training of staff to carry out there respective duties.

He said the Local Government Ministry and the services commission are responsible for training, but they have slacked up in that regard.

"So in terms of building institutional capacity, we need to focus some more on that [training]," Mr. Reid said.