KINGSTON, Jamaica – With the National Water Commission (NWC) facing challenges to collect the $20 billion consumers owe for water, it is finding it difficult to reinstate a roadways that have been dug up for pipe laying and fixing leaks across the Corporate Area, Michael Dunn, vice president Customer Delivery told Tuesday’s Kingston and St Andrew Corporation (KSAC) council meeting.

The fixing of the roadways, he said, was tied to being able to collect the debt.

“If we can collect the monies we would be in a better position for service,” Dunn said.

During the question and answer section of the presentation made by the NWC at the meeting, councillors complained that despite several calls to the commission, they had failed to reinstate roads they had dug up.

Keon Hinds, NWC Regional Water Supply and Distribution manager (South East), told the councillors that through a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between the NWC and the National Works Agency (NWA), roads that were dug up were reinstated. He said that the MOU was still in effect.

Explaining how the MOU worked, Hinds said that the NWA did not fix each road that was dug up immediately, but waited on a number of cuts (12 to 15) to fix. He said that there was an NWA bank account into which the NWC transferred funds based on the cost of the cuts to be fixed. Even if the funds put into the account by the NWC were insufficient, the NWA would still do the work, Hinds said.

He said that a number of outstanding cuts had been submitted to the NWA for reinstatement.

Dunn told the councillors that despite the difficulties, the NWC was trying to do what it could to alleviate the situation.

Although there was no money to pay the NWA, the NWC said it would try to fix the roads the councillors complained about, in short order.

“We met with the NWA last week and we realise that there is a problem,” Dunn said.

Meanwhile, Kingston Mayor Angela Brown Burke told the NWC representatives that there was a need for more collaboration between the NWC and the KSAC.

“When you plan to work on the roads you should send us a list,” the mayor said.

Brown Burke said that she would ask the chairman of the Roads and Traffic Committee to speak with councillors and tabulate a list of the various roads to be reinstated. Some of the areas where councillors said roads  had been dug up and needed to be fixed included, Forest Hills, Elletson Flats, Grants Pen, Lincoln Avenue, and Hughenden.

Claudienne Edwards