Garbage trucks creating health hazard for city resident
A Belize City man is crying for help to solve health hazards caused by garbage trucks parked at his home near the Pound Yard Bridge. Jose Sanchez reports.
Jose Sanchez, Reporting
Colin Ebanks and his family of four are affected by garbage trucks parked in a yard across the alley in front of his house. The constant stench and the flies have been problematic for months and he hopes that someone in authority will deal with the situation as soon as possible.
Colin Ebanks, Angry Resident
“These three garbage trucks that is parked next to me, I’ve been complaining about it for weeks. When the north wind is blowing I can’t even open my house because of the stench. You can take a flash with the camera after this and see all the blue concas that have been harbouring from the trucks and that’s the problem I’ve been complaining for months. I went to City Council, they send me to different people. They come here, they say they were gonna give a letter to the people that control the truck and so far they haven’t don that yet because nothing has been done about it and this is from the year start. I’ve been complaining.”
Jose Sanchez
“Are you willing to accept the trucks being here as long as they find a way to deal with the flies?”
Colin Ebanks
“If they can deal with the flies and deal with the stench, I have no problem.”
City Councillor in charge of sanitation and public health, Wayne Usher, said he got reports of garbage disposal problems in the alley and not of trucks bringing stench. Since that misunderstanding is cleared up, he will do everything possible to make the neighbourhood stench and fly free for residents.
Wayne Usher, City Councillor
“There isn’t any garbage to be picked up but there is a garbage truck parked in the area, that’s where it parks, that needs to be sanitized, that needs to be cleaned up after they finish with their work. Not any vehicle from the City Council, not from Waste Control, this is a private entity that parks adjacent to the house of the person complaining. What we need to do and what I will do, is this afternoon get the Public Health Department officer and someone from my department and we will go and visit the owners of that truck. Whenever they have finished their work they need to clean up that vehicle, sanitise it because that’s when the flies go into this gentleman’s house. So that’s how we’re going to attend to this. It’s not garbage is there to pick up or else I would have done that from this morning, but we have to make sure that the owners clean their truck whenever they finish at the end of each day or at the end of their operations.”
Reporting for News Five, Jose Sanchez.
