Vendors want to remain on streets for Christmas
IT was a echo from a year ago.
Vendors who clog the streets of downtown Kingston are willing to relocate to arcades and markets. But after Christmas.
“Allow us to eat some Christmas,” said Dunstan Whittingham, the president of the Vendors, Higglers and Market Association.
It was an appeal to new local government minister, Portia Simpson Miller and the Kingston and St Andrew Corporation (KSAC), the local government authority, to stay their efforts to enforce regulations and remove illegal vendors from the streets.
There was no immediate decision on what would happen, but Simpson Miller, at a meeting with more than 100 vendors, said that while “people must make a living, they must do so legally”.
She hoped that yesterday’s meeting at the Jamaica Conference Centre, would be the beginning of a consensus on an approach to bringing order to downtown. More meetings are to be held.
The call by the vendors was a replay of last year’s fiasco when the government, under pressure from the Jamaica Chamber of Commerce (JCC) to clean up and redevelop the old section of the capital, abandoned its efforts to force street sellers into designated vending areas in the face of resistance.
Again yesterday, the vendors asked to be allowed to stay until after the busy, and lucrative Christmas sale period.
But the exasperation of the much-criticised KSAC officials was apparent when councillor Angela Burke-Browne spoke.
“The KSAC will not be the laughing stock this year,” she said. “… law and order must prevail even though some will not like what I have to say.”
She was heckled by the vendors.
An estimated, 7,000 vendors and other street sellers, according to a 1996 study, operate in downtown Kingston, but that figure is believed to double at Christmas time.
Despite the sporadic efforts by the KSAC at enforcement, the vendors still operate on streets where roadside selling is banned, causing the Chamber of Commerce in September to lead a one-day shutdown of businesses by its members in the city.
The JCC also wants the government to implement a major redevelopment plan it has drawn up for the old business district.
Simpson Miller agreed that something has to be done.
“Downtown Kingston cannot continue to be dirty and nasty,” the minister said.