Mayors form association

The mayors of Belize’s two cities and seven towns have found out there is some truth to the saying “two heads are better than one.” In this case it’s nine heads because they have collectively formed the Mayors Association which meets once a month to do some problem sharing and solving for their respective municipalities.

Reynaldo Burgos, President, Mayors Association

“Some mayors have less experience than others. In this past year we had an election. Three of the Mayors are incumbents, who was myself, the mayor of San Pedro, the mayor of Belize and we have been helping the other mayors come around because some of them didn’t know what was involved with being a mayor. We had a little more experience, well David Fonseca from Belize has more experience than all of us. We have our meetings and we discuss many problems that we have and sometimes we find out that the new mayors know a little more than we do. The main part has been the exchange of ideas and when we have any problems with central government we all get together as a body to go and talk to the Prime Minister and we usually find out that the results better than some of us going individually cause when we go as individuals they might not pay us as much mind as when we go as a body.”

Burgos says that sixty-six percent of the revenue of the councils comes from property tax, liquor and trade licensing and while they are working on expanding their independence, they still rely on central government for project funding.