MAY PEN, Clarendon — “The parish is not ready!” an adamant Councillor Scean Barnswell (People’s National Party, Hayes Division) insisted during Thursday’s sitting of the Clarendon Municipal Corporation.

He was vehement in his disagreement with a report given by parish disaster coordinator, Eleanor Coombs-Waithe. The discussion was about preparations for the ongoing hurricane season.

“Maybe her report as it relates to what she has been doing in preparing the parish for any eventuality may mean it’s ready but the parish is not ready, Mr Chairman,” Barnswell continued.

“I remember saying the parish is a disaster parish; we have areas in the parish that have been flooding from 2020 until now. And while the municipal corporation is doing what it can, the National Works Agency (NWA) refuses to carry out maintenance of the critical drains that link communities — then we are being blamed for not doing our work,” he said.

Barnswell, who is also the minority leader, explained that numerous areas are being affected and that without the support of the NWA residents will be severely affected. He made specific reference to sections of the parish that were flooded on Thursday.

“We need to look at what is happening and how we can get it fixed. The last time any drains were cleaned was in 2016 when a massive drain-cleaning exercise took place in the parish. Only two Members of Parliament live in the parish. The others drive in and drive out and so they don’t know what is happening in the parish, they don’t listen to us — so, we are suffering because of incompetence or ignorance or arrogance,” he argued.

Kenneth Davis (Jamaica Labour Party, May Pen East Division) sought to remind his colleagues that some of the problems had dragged on for years.

“It is not just today, yesterday, or last year. I want us to separate the municipal drains from the NWA drains. Truth be told, we have been doing our duty by cleaning our drains. We are doing developments, and in these developments we are not making the necessary adjustments. An area that used to have 10 houses now has 50 and the drainage infrastructure remains the same, not a thing has been done. We need to work this out in a way so we don’t get the blame. We have been saying this over the years that NWA has not been coming to meetings. Nothing can be fixed unless we extend the drains — they cannot remain the same,” he said.

“We are going to continue to come here and talk next week, next month, and next year. If nothing is being done we are going to come here and use this as a talk shop.

“But we need to act — and act decisively — because we were sent here by the people to represent them and we are the ones being questioned,” Davis said in a spirited address to the meeting.

In a bid to calm flaring tempers, Chairman Winston Maragh reminded his colleagues that during this period there is usually above-average rainfall, and flooding is expected.

“We are expecting that even if you clean them, if it rains for a certain period you are going to have flooding. It’s not only Jamaica experiencing this, almost all the Caribbean countries have a similar problem,” he said.