Hous­ing Min­is­ter David Lee has out­lined plans to con­struct more than 3,300 sin­gle-fam­i­ly homes across Trinidad over the next 15 months, say­ing the Gov­ern­ment’s hous­ing pro­gramme will not dis­crim­i­nate based on po­lit­i­cal af­fil­i­a­tion.

For sev­en years, Gen­e­sis Mendez and her com­mon-law hus­band, An­to­nio Escalona, have made Trinidad their home af­ter flee­ing Venezuela for a bet­ter life.

With farm­ing in­tern­ships ex­pect­ed to triple from 30 to 100 par­tic­i­pants, of­fer­ing more young peo­ple an op­por­tu­ni­ty to en­ter agri­cul­ture and busi­ness, agri­cul­tur­al con­sul­tant Riyadh Mo­hammed says the coun­try’s abil­i­ty to turn its agri­cul­tur­al in­vest­ment in­to tan­gi­ble ben­e­fits will de­pend on how ef­fec­tive­ly poli­cies are im­ple­ment­ed.

Ch­aguara­mas/Pt Cumana coun­cil­lor Kevon Williams claims res­i­dents are fac­ing sys­tem­at­ic vic­tim­i­sa­tion through pro­longed wa­ter dis­rup­tions, ac­cus­ing the Wa­ter and Sew­er­age Au­thor­i­ty (WASA) of of­fer­ing shift­ing ex­pla­na­tions while com­mu­ni­ties en­dure weeks and, in some cas­es, months with­out a sup­ply.

Pen­sion­ers have wel­comed the Gov­ern­ment’s de­ci­sion to in­crease the se­nior cit­i­zens grant by $250, but the Trinidad and To­ba­go As­so­ci­a­tion for Re­tired Per­sons (TTARP) is call­ing for the in­come cap to be in­creased from $5,500 to $6,000 a month so more el­der­ly peo­ple can ben­e­fit.

Ch­agua­nas May­or Faaiq Mo­hammed has de­fend­ed the in­tro­duc­tion of a $5 fee to use the wash­rooms at Ch­agua­nas Mar­ket, say­ing the charges are nec­es­sary to main­tain the fa­cil­i­ties and pre­vent them from falling in­to dis­re­pair.

Port-of-Spain May­or Chin­ua Al­leyne has ac­cused the Gov­ern­ment of re­duc­ing fund­ing for garbage col­lec­tion and com­mu­ni­ty de­vel­op­ment projects, ar­gu­ing that in­creas­es high­light­ed in the 2027 Bud­get are large­ly be­ing used to cov­er back­pay oblig­a­tions rather than im­prove ser­vices for res­i­dents.

Mo­torists were charged with traf­fic of­fences and sus­pect­ed mar­i­jua­na, a firearm and am­mu­ni­tion were seized dur­ing a four-hour po­lice ex­er­cise across three di­vi­sions on Thurs­day.

The life, ca­reer and lega­cy of ca­lyp­so leg­end Slinger “Mighty Spar­row” Fran­cis­co was yes­ter­day cel­e­brat­ed true to the larg­er-than-life per­sona he craft­ed in charm­ing gen­er­a­tions of mu­sic lovers over decades.

Prime Min­is­ters Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar and Mia Mot­t­ley have laud­ed the Mighty Spar­row for his con­tri­bu­tions to Caribbean cul­ture, not­ing that his tal­ent as a sto­ry­teller went be­yond that of an or­di­nary en­ter­tain­er and was clos­er to that of a his­to­ri­an, doc­u­ment­ing the evo­lu­tion of Caribbean peo­ple and so­ci­eties across decades.

The Trinidad and To­ba­go Air­line Pi­lots As­so­ci­a­tion (TTAL­PA) is rec­om­mend­ing that Caribbean Air­lines name one of its new Boe­ing 737 air­craft af­ter ca­lyp­so leg­end Dr Slinger Fran­cis­co, the Mighty Spar­row.

It was more a cel­e­bra­tion than a fu­ner­al yes­ter­day, as steel­pan mu­sic, tra­di­tion­al mas and the red, white and black of na­tion­al flags brought the streets of Port-of-Spain alive for Slinger “Mighty Spar­row” Fran­cis­co’s farewell pa­rade.