Contractor continuing preparatory works for city parking meters

-PSC maintains objections

Even as the city’s parking meter contract continues to face stiff opposition from the business community, contractor Smart City Solutions (SCS) has started to install supporting infrastructure for the meters.

Stabroek News on Tuesday observed steel pipes erected at the junction of Water and Robb streets as well as outside of the nearby Republic Bank, Fogarty’s, the Guyana Post Office Corporation, the Guyana Lottery Company’s Regional Office and other businesses.

Over the past two months, the company has started demarcating areas in which the meters would be placed. The company has delineated spaces to install an estimated 400 parking meters within the central business district of Georgetown.

Steel pipes installed at areas where meters would be placed in front of Fogarty’s.

Although early last month, Managing Director of Business Development of SCS Amir Oren had announced that the meters would be rolled out by mid-December, it is unclear if the company is still working to meet that deadline.

While these preparatory works are ongoing, the Private Sector Commission (PSC) has issued a call for the project to be halted.

In advertisements placed in the Monday and Tuesday editions of Stabroek News, the PSC highlighted “flaws” it found in the deal. In the ad placed in Monday’s edition, it said there is “impropriety and secrecy surrounding the planning and arrival of this project, in fact every citizen should have been fully informed.”

The PSC questioned the details of the contract, while noting that the different classes of society would be affected both socially and financially by the implementation of the meters.

In another advertisement appearing in Tuesday’s edition of Stabroek News, the PSC highlighted the fact that even though a deal was signed for the installation of parking meters, it “still has the ‘status’ of by-passing national procurement legislation and procedures.”

The PSC further pointed out that despite recommended re-negotiations, the city did not manage to strike a lucrative deal for the use of its street spaces by the investor. The parking meter fees are seen as a form of indirect tax on the citizens and visitors of the city.

The Georgetown City Council would be collecting 20% of the gross income annually after the meters are operationalised.

The project is divided into two phases, with the first phase expected to see the installation of 157 meters to cover 3,237 spaces, while in the second phase, expected to be implemented in the first three months of 2017, approximately 163 meters would be installed to cover 4,000 spaces.

The meters would be operational from Monday to Saturday, from 7 am to 7 pm.

The rate for the parking meters is $50 for 15 minutes, which would be sold via prepaid cards. It was stated that if a person spends less than the time purchased, there would be no refund.

The PSC is not alone in criticising the deal.The Transparency Institute of Guyana Inc and Deputy Mayor Sherod Duncan have been very critical of the deal and believe that it should be scrapped in light of procurement regulations not being followed. Members of the public have also criticised it.

Controversy has raged around the deal for months because of the secrecy surrounding it, the fact that it was not publicly tendered and the likely cost to citizens.

A Ministry of Finance review severely criticised the initial contract, saying that procurement rules may have been transgressed, while a review by the Attorney General’s Chambers also pointed out that the terms highly favoured the contractor.

The reviews, however, did not find the contract to be illegal and the central government recommended only that the city renegotiate the contract after seeking the advice of an accountant.

In October, a majority of city councillors voted to approve amendments to the contract, including a lower toll as well as the reduction of the length of the contract to 20 years from 49 years.