WESTERN BUREAU – The fountain in Montego Bay’s historic Sam Sharpe Square, is to be redesigned by the St James Parish Council, but only if the National Heritage Trust allows it.

Suzette Brown-Johnson, the council’s public relations officer, said a design was completed recently and sent to the Trust for their approval.

The fountain has been left unattended for over a year now and currently serves as a garbage, which no longer attracts the eye of passing tourists as a thing of beauty. Rather, it has become an area where the city’s homeless and mentally ill persons go to take a bath in the stagnant water which has settled there. Meanwhile Brown-Johnson said that there were plans to restore the fountain to its former state.

“There are now plans to change out the railing as well as to change the style of the fountain. As a result, the Jamaica National Heritage Trust has been written to because it (the fountain) is a national monument,” she said. “The drawings were done similar to what existed there because we don’t want it to be far off from what existed there.” While the council awaits the response of the Trust, chairman for the Civic

Affairs Committee Barrry Solomon is in negotiations with the city’s private sector to construct the rails and do the landscaping.

The Trust has said in the interim that it has not received the proposal from the council, and that they were therefore not in a position to speak on the issue.

“We have not received any such correspondence at this point, and therefore we are not able to speak to the matter,” said Angella Fraser, a representative of the Trust.

Brown-Johnson insists the Trust is well aware of the planned design. According to her, a representative from the Trust had visited one of their civic committee meetings and had promised to get back to the council on the matter.