City Hall announces garbage collection rates for businesses; private contractors to pay haulage

Last Updated on Monday, 21 August 2017, 18:14 by Denis Chabrol

City Hall on Monday announced the rates for the collection of and disposal of waste from businesses in Georgetown, and said private contractors providing such a service separately to businesses would also have to pay haulage fees

Town Clerk, Royston King announced that from September 1, 2017 small businesses would have to pay City Hall GYD$5,000 per month; medium businesses GYD$8,000 per month and large businesses GYD$12,000 per month.

“This decision was taken by Council after extensive consultations and discussions with different stakeholders including members of the local private sector and non-governmental organizations and community based groups,” King said in a statement.

The Town Clerk explained that City Hall could no longer afford to spend GYD$50 million monthly on disposing domestic and commercial waste, a service that is already being subsidized. “The council could no longer sustain this on its current very narrow revenue base, it has to broaden its revenue base,” he said.  The Town Clerk noted that over the last three years, the collection and disposal of 2,232,235 tons of waste cost the city GYD$1.4 billion. This year,  council has budgeted $1.2 billion for waste collection.

He also announced that private contractors who are hauling industrial and commercial waste through Georgetown would have to “compensate citizens by paying a percentage of the cost charged against businesses.” He did not say what percentage would be charged.

Although the private contractors, Cevons Waste Management and Purans  Disposal, earlier this month suspended services because City Hall owes them more than GYD$300 million dating back to 2015, King said  the Mayor and City Council was doing generally well in collecting garbage in the face of some minor hiccups.

“In the circumstances, the council is happy to report that all areas of the city continue to receive garbage clearance by the council. Additionally, there have been some delays due to mechanical and other short comings and the fact that, some of our staff are not very familiar with some of the inner streets in some local communities. But these have been remedied and over the coming weeks council will approve this service to citizens,” he said. Three small private contractors have been hired to supplement City Hall’s Solid Waste Management Division’s operations in removing and disposing garbage.

Despite King’s assurances, Demerara Waves Online News has observed that for several weeks now mounds of silt removed from under the Lamaha Street pavement partition are still on that pedestrian walkway. Also, the bins on the avenues of Thomas, East, Waterloo and Carmichael Streets have been overflowing and the garbage strewn along those pedestrian thoroughfares.

The Town Clerk further announced that over the next two weeks, the council would put on the streets of Georgetown patrols armed with cameras and other things to persuade litter bugs to desist from hurting the environment and to contribute to the sustainable development of the city of Georgetown.

“Also, the council will be moving a pace to seek the support of the competent authorities to introduce the ticketing system against litter and the indiscriminate dumping of garbage in the City of Georgetown,” he said.