Rad­hi­ca Sookraj

?San Fer­nan­do City Cor­po­ra­tion is mov­ing to clear and sell aban­doned lots which are pos­ing health haz­ards to the pub­lic. Speak­ing at the cor­po­ra­tion's month­ly statu­to­ry meet­ing at City Hall yes­ter­day, San Fer­nan­do May­or Ken­neth Fer­gu­son said there were 561 va­cant lots in the city, many of which were breed­ing grounds for mos­qui­toes, rats and oth­er ver­min. He said dur­ing a pre­vi­ous statu­to­ry meet­ing the cor­po­ra­tion de­cid­ed to get a list of all the own­ers of the lots.

Fer­gu­son said the cor­po­ra­tion was sup­posed to is­sue no­tices man­dat­ing that the lots be cleared by the own­ers. How­ev­er, al­der­man Kennedy Flem­ming said since the meet­ing on­ly 36 lots have been cleared. He agreed the lots were pos­ing a health haz­ard to the pub­lic. Fer­gu­son then in­quired from the Pub­lic Health Com­mit­tee whether in­di­vid­ual no­tices were sent to the own­ers, in­form­ing them of the prob­lem. How­ev­er, Prin­ci­pal Med­ical Of­fi­cer of Health Dr In­grid Poon-King said a pub­lic no­tice was made in the me­dia.

She said own­ers were warned, via the me­dia, that if they failed to clear their lots, then the cor­po­ra­tion would clear them and bill the own­er. How­ev­er, Fer­gu­son said the time had passed for bu­reau­crat­ic pro­ce­dure. He added: "We have to get around this sys­tem. It is tak­ing too long. Why are we wait­ing for pro­ce­dure? It is easy to clear it and put it up for sale and put the cor­po­ra­tion's num­ber to call," Fer­gu­son said. He ex­plained the city had records of all the own­ers of the prop­er­ties.

Coun­cil­lor Car­ol Cuffy-Dowlat al­so slammed the ad­min­is­tra­tion arm of the cor­po­ra­tion, say­ing that there seemed to be a�dis­con­nect be­tween the rates and tax­es of­fi­cials and oth­er de­part­ments. She said: "The city is small and we have not yet con­tact­ed the own­ers? That is not ac­cept­able. We must have a com­pre­hen­sive list of all the own­ers." She al­so said all 561 lot own­ers must be con­tact­ed in­di­vid­u­al­ly and ac­tion must be tak­en to clear the aban­doned

prop­er­ties.