The Mayor and City Council’s Legal Affairs Committee will be meeting today to discuss the way forward as it relates to the recently implemented container fees, according to a City Hall source.
The source said that members of the Finance Committee will also be a part of the meeting. The source said they would like to explore all avenues to determine how best they can legally address the container fees.
On Friday last, the municipality withdrew an action filed against a company for payment of the fees after the company’s attorney, Sase Gunraj argued that the charge was bad in law.
At the last statutory meeting of the city, councillors had decided to review the terms under which the fee was being collected.
Town Clerk Royston King had explained to the current councillors that the previous council had approved that businesses pay $25,000 once they are offloading a container and using up the city’s streets.
The Private Sector Commission (PSC) and the Georgetown Chamber of Commerce and Industry had raised concerns about the fee.
The PSC sought legal advice and were told by Gunraj that the fee is arbitrary and unlawful. He also said that from the City (Markets) By-laws appended to the Municipal and District Councils Act, the fee is not applicable. The section states, “All goods or livestock taken from any vessel alongside any market stelling and landed at any other stelling or place within the City shall pay market fees, if they have not been already paid at the entry of the vessel; and any person refusing to pay the fees for goods or livestock so landed shall be liable on summary conviction to a fine of five thousand dollars.”
The section, Gunraj said has no application to the landing of vessels at private wharves as they are not connected to markets of any kind.
