New mayors attend seminar in Belmopan
They are still on something of a honeymoon following the March first election, but this week the reality of handling their duties was brought home to Belize’s new municipal leaders at a seminar in the nation’s capital.
Janelle Chanona, Reporting
For the last two days mayors, deputy mayors, city administrators and other officials participated in an orientation workshop coordinated by the Ministry of Local Government to ensure a smooth transition of the new local leadership across the country.
The hot topic on the table was property taxes. But make no mistake, most of the U.D.P. Mayors are seeing red because their municipal accounts are in serious trouble. It?s a situation that will force them to get creative with their finances … and fast.
Hilberto Campos, Corozal Mayor
?The figures were nil, the party basically handed over a town council with no funds. Didn?t went into the red figures, but no funds. We started from zero and it?s a brand new start, we are starting right from nil.?
Janelle Chanona
?How do you expect to continue operating the town board with that reality in mind??
Hilberto Campos
?It?s a reality, it?s not really a problem for me. Very much soon we will be presenting the public of Corozal with the full statement, this gratuity that the councillors and mayor authorised themselves in the town council, regardless of the condition they are going to leave it to us, but that?s not a problem … Hard work, dedication, and transparency, like how I telling you, very soon we are going to present it to people from Corozal.?
Janelle Chanona
?What can Corozalenos expect from the new U.D.P. city council in the very near future??
Hilberto Campos
?I have started meeting with the Mexican delegates from Chetumal and pretty much soon we are going to have a very good relationship with them; cultural exchange programmes, and of course, a lot of help from all over.?
Ravei Nunez, Orange Walk Mayor
?The only discovery we have made so far was the issue about the severance pay that the council decided to pay themselves. We?ve been saying that it is not illegal, it?s unethical because you have a broke town council and yet they agreed to pay themselves thirty percent of their salaries as a form of severance pay. And so, that is the issue we brought to the Orange Walk public, that is our foremost issue right now.?
Janelle Chanona
?When you get down to running Orange Walk, what are you focusing on first??
Ravei Nunez
?Okay, our first thing what we are going to focus on is transparency. The workshop today is to teach us the legalities of showing transparency. Of course we have be within the realm of the laws, and so that is what we are learning today, to make sure that what we do, we do it right and proper so we can be transparent to the public.?
Frank ?Papa? Mena, Dangriga Mayor
?I must give credit to Mr. Nunez and the work that he has done; I need to acknowledge his work. But there?s still a lot of work that is left to be done and we found that overdraft, and we have to deal with that overdraft. We found those payables, and we have to deal with those payables and that?s the bottom line.?
Janelle Chanona
?When you actually get to the business of running Dangriga, what is the priority project you are going to be focusing on??
Frank ?Papa? Mena
?Well it must be economic based, it must be finding ways, implementing strategies, and coming up with innovative ideas of giving our people the opportunity to make some money. Our focus is tourism, and you?ve been to yaad to see the diverse of everything that we have. From culture to plant and animal life, and even just ideas, the diverse ideas that we have. But we haven?t been able to enjoy the sweets of the tourism industry, so we are putting in place a couple of meetings with those important people within the tourism industry and look at our ability and whatever we need to do, whatever infrastructure we need to put in to accommodate that so what our people can benefit from that.?
P.G. Mayor Carlos Galvez heads one of two split councils … a council which includes his own brother as a member of the U.D.P. team. Galvez says Punta Gorda will come before politics.
Carlos Galvez, Punta Gorda Mayor
?I explained to my colleagues that we must put our political differences aside and work in the best interest of our people. The people have spoken in a free and fair elections and we must put politics aside and it?s time to work. That has been straight forward. And the councillors they are now finding out some of what are the real issues that are affecting our community and we must address them.?
Janelle Chanona
?As far as decision making, we know that you and your one councillor are in the minority. Are you all going to go democratic and say, majority rules??
Carlos Galvez
?No, we must come to a consensus. We must come to a consensus and understand. We have both manifestos, we have a People?s United Party manifesto and a United Democratic Party manifesto, and we must come to a consensus and find a solution in cooperating, working both and addressing concerns at every level.?
Janelle Chanona
?So you are agreeing with me then, majority will rule, once everybody agrees, it will go forward or do you get more power because you are the Mayor??
Carlos Galvez
?No, what happen is that a lot of the civil projects will be aid and funded directly from central government.?
Mayor of the twin towns John August is the leader of one of three U.D.P. teams that took over from party counterparts.
John August Jr., San Ignacio/Santa Elena Mayor
?Right now we are just organising ourselves. Every leader has a different way of doing things, so right now I?m organising myself. My team is getting organized also so we can start completing our manifesto for the next three years.?
Janelle Chanona
?During the election period, drains and streets were a big issue for residents … how are you going to tackle that??
John August, Jr.
?Yes, well so far, the week and a half that I?ve been in the town council a lot of people are coming in and they want to assist, residents of the community, with the drains. They gonna put a part and we gonna put a part. So that?s another project we are looking at and hopefully not too far down the road we?ll start working on that also.?
And while Belize City is deep in the hole, the new Belmopan City Council was the only team to find any serious money in its accounts. Mayor Simeon Lopez is already thinking long term.
Simeon Lopez, Belmopan Mayor
?We are seeing with the coming of the embassies into Belmopan, we are seeing a much improved Belmopan. We are seeing or foreseeing a vision of Belmopan where people will be safe, and set as much as possible our crime control into progress and get people involved into the building of the city. It has a long way to go yet. It has a long way and as I said, the long term is for a city continuing to be well planned and beautiful.?
And while all the Mayors agree that they will work with the P.U.P. central government, they make no bones about how they feel about political operatives on their payrolls.
Frank ?Papa? Mena, Dangriga Mayor
?We want a good working relationship and I will keep on emphasising that for us the politics is over. And I will reiterate my message at the inauguration, those who deliberately try to hinder our upward mobility, I am just recommending that they tender their resignation, especially if they were political appointees, because that is not in the best interest of Dangriga.?
