By Ramona Luthi
The Mayor and City Council (M&CC) is expected to meet with the owners and operators of heavy duty vehicles operating in Georgetown to decide on a fee for them to pay towards the repair and maintenance of the roads.
This is according to a press statement released by Town Clerk, Royston King on Friday.
According to the statement, the heavy duty single axel trucks are contributing to road fatigue, stress and the destruction of Council roads in many parts of the city.
Moreover, whilst acknowledging that theM&CC is responsible- in accordance to law- to maintain the facilities, City Hall does not have the resources to fulfil this obligation.
“Its narrow revenue base coupled with the unwillingness of some property owners to pay their rates to the Council conspires to restrict the Council’s ability to repair and maintain roads. In the meantime owners and operators of heavy duty vehicles continue to use many of these broken and poorly maintained roads to haul tons of commodities to businesses. Of greater concern to the Council is the fact that many of those roads are unsafe and facilitates accidents,” the statement said.
As such, the Georgetown Municipality is maintaining that it is “important and necessary” that owners and operators of heavy duty vehicles using city roads meet with the Council and agree to make a contribution for repairing and maintaining those facilities.
To this end, over the next two weeks, the Council intends to engage all the relevant parties in “special sessions” to come to an agreement on a way forward.
Meanwhile, City Council is also said to be contemplating an approach to benefit from licensing of vehicles in the city.
“Georgetown Municipality believes that its statutory responsibilities with respect to roads must also have a corresponding right to access a percentage of the revenue obtained through licensing of vehicles to use Council roads and all connected facilities.”
