MINISTER of Local Government and Community Development Noel Arscott says that his ministry will be spending $90 million in 2014/15 to construct new buildings to house the St Thomas and Westmoreland parish councils, as well as the Portmore Municipal Council.

Arscott told the House of Representatives on Tuesday that the money has been approved from the ministry’s Equalisation Fund to start the construction of new council buildings for St Thomas ($25 million), Westmoreland ($35 million), and the Portmore Municipal Council’s new administrative office ($25 million). He did not clarify how the additional $5 million would be spent.

The minister said that council buildings were, in most instances, inadequate to accommodate and satisfy the volume of work being done. The new buildings will enable the three councils to reduce the cost of rental and to operate in a more business-friendly environment, he added.

However, plans and funding for the construction of these buildings date back to 2008, and in some cases it had been reported that work had already started, with total costs more than three times the figure announced by the minister on Tuesday.

Arscott had announced during last month’s installation of new Mayor of Morant Bay Ludlow Mathison that a building would be constructed to house the St Thomas Parish Council. He said that efforts are now being made to find a site for the new structure.

The new building, he said, would be equipped with a computerised system, which would make the approval of development planning applications more efficient and transparent.

The regular meeting room of the council at the Morant Bay Courthouse was destroyed in a fire in February 2007, and repairs were done to an old building at Church Corner in the parish capital to facilitate monthly council meetings.

The Westmoreland Parish Council had been using the Anglican Church Hall in Savanna-la- Mar to hold regular monthly meetings for several years, due to the lack of space at the existing parish council building which also houses the Savanna-la-Mar Resident Magistrate’s Court.

However, it was reported in 2009 that the council was trying to sell two parcels of lands it owned, which could earn roughly $11 million, towards starting the building of a new office complex. But this was considered a drop in the bucket at the time, as the new facility being considered was expected to cost in excess of $100 million.

It could not be ascertained whether the $35 million allocation is to construct a new facility, or to upgrade the current one. But in 2011, the then government had announced that $30 million had been budgeted for a new council building, which was expected to include a mayor’s parlour, accounts department, secretary/manager’s office and a meeting or conference room at a total cost of $41.5 million.

Mayor of Savanna-la-Mar Bertel Moore confirmed then that the council building was already in the first phase of its development, and would include the features just mentioned.

He added that the ministry had already given the council $2.5 million from the Equalisation Fund, and had approved another $31 million to enable the commencement of construction at an early date. He also pointed out that construction should take 12-18 months.

In July, 2008, the Portmore Municipal Council signed a management consultancy contract to develop and construct a new 300,000- square foot Municipal Complex in Portmore, St Catherine. The building should have been built on lands across from the Portmore Mall, behind Captain’s Bakery.

Speaking at the signing ceremony at the Council’s conference room in Portmore Pines Plaza, Greater Portmore, then Mayor Keith Hinds said phase one of the project would include the writing of a business development plan and a risk management assessment for the new building. Financing for the project would have been secured after the completion of phase one.

“We expect within at least two months to have this part of the first phase finalised, out of the way and moving to the second phase, which is looking seriously at financing and how we are going to put up this building in short order,” Hinds

said then.

He also explained that office space at the building would be available to accommodate a tax office, a court house, the Registrar General’s Department, and banks.