KEVON FELMINE

Se­nior Re­porter

kevon.felmine@guardian.co.tt

San Fer­nan­do May­or Robert Par­ris has wel­comed the Gov­ern­ment’s plan to con­struct a wa­ter­front ho­tel, con­fer­ence cen­tre, and ocean­front res­i­dences in San Fer­nan­do.

Speak­ing to re­porters yes­ter­day, Par­ris said he sup­ports any ini­tia­tive to re­vi­talise the city. The San Fer­nan­do City Cor­po­ra­tion (SFCC) has iden­ti­fied tourism, cul­ture, arts, sports, and ed­u­ca­tion as key sec­tors for de­vel­op­ment. He de­scribed the plan as the be­gin­ning of the city’s di­ver­si­fi­ca­tion strat­e­gy and not­ed strong in­ter­est from the busi­ness sec­tor.

As part of the Re­vi­tal­i­sa­tion Blue­print launched by Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar at the Diplo­mat­ic Cen­tre last Thurs­day, the Gov­ern­ment pro­pos­es to trans­form San Fer­nan­do’s wa­ter­front. The plan en­vi­sions a vi­brant coastal city through projects such as Plaza San Car­los, a new wa­ter­front ho­tel and con­ven­tion cen­tre, Health City South, and mod­ern res­i­den­tial and trans­port hubs.

At the San Fer­nan­do Mar­ket, Par­ris said this was not the first wa­ter­front plan he had seen, but he wel­comed the con­ti­nu­ity from one ad­min­is­tra­tion to the next.

“I have been around for a long time, and it is not the first time I have heard these plans, but I am en­cour­aged. All de­vel­op­ments dri­ve the cul­ture, cre­ate jobs in the city, and spark in­ter­est in how peo­ple op­er­ate here. They may al­so at­tract more busi­ness­es,” Par­ris said.

He re­called for­mer prime min­is­ter Patrick Man­ning’s Vi­sion 2020, which in­clud­ed de­vel­op­ment plans for San Fer­nan­do, and said res­i­dents ea­ger­ly an­tic­i­pate tan­gi­ble im­prove­ments in the city’s in­fra­struc­ture.

“For a very long time, I be­lieved that the sec­ond city had been ig­nored, and I say that re­spect­ful­ly. Cer­tain­ly, all that we are see­ing: this is not the first wa­ter­front plan we have seen, and we are hap­py that the lev­el of con­tin­u­a­tion is go­ing on from the pre­vi­ous gov­ern­ment in­to this gov­ern­ment. I am hop­ing that Mu­cu­rapo Street and the plans we had for it come to fruition.”

Par­ris added that a ma­jor busi­ness stake­hold­er has ex­pressed in­ter­est in sup­port­ing the city’s re­vi­tal­i­sa­tion of Mu­cu­rapo Street. He said he will con­tin­ue to lob­by the Gov­ern­ment to as­sist the SFCC in boost­ing San Fer­nan­do, in­clud­ing Mu­cu­rapo Street, and high­light­ed the ex­ten­sive work the coun­cil has al­ready put in­to city up­grade plans.

He not­ed that some gov­ern­ment mem­bers had pre­vi­ous­ly met with the San Fer­nan­do may­or to dis­cuss plans, as they were San Fer­nan­do projects rather than par­ty projects.

Par­ris al­so ad­dressed con­cerns raised by street ven­dors over re­cent­ly des­ig­nat­ed vend­ing ar­eas. De­spite ven­dors not tak­ing up the spots, with some opt­ing to vend il­le­gal­ly on High Street, he said some mem­bers of the Pe­nal com­mu­ni­ty are ask­ing per­mis­sion to use the stalls, which re­main avail­able.

“At the end of the day, we are pro­vid­ing sus­tain­able op­por­tu­ni­ties for en­tre­pre­neur­ship in the city of San Fer­nan­do. We will not dis­crim­i­nate. Peo­ple have to un­der­stand the cul­ture in San Fer­nan­do. We have fought for le­gal vend­ing zones, and the mar­ket is one of them. All we are en­cour­ag­ing is for peo­ple to do the right thing,” he said.

The may­or added that the SFCC is col­lab­o­rat­ing with the TTPS, which has a crime plan, to fur­ther sup­port ini­tia­tives that boost safe­ty and de­vel­op­ment in San Fer­nan­do.