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Belize City Councilor, Philip Willoughby, has come up with a plan which he will present to Mayor Darrel Bradley and his fellow Councilors on how to better streamline the business of the Council.  Willoughby shared his plan with Love News today.  He said that in order for services and better enhancement to take place at the Council, the first thing that needs to change is the departmentalization of the support staff.  This would give one member of a particular department in the Council the same authority to execute the duties of any other member from another of the Council’s departments.

PHILIP WILLOUGHBY

City Councilor

Belize City Council

“The Council has its enforcement departments; it’s not to say that we act in isolation of each other or we aren’t harmonizing but I believe the time has come now, based on the discussion in the public that these department walls need to be removed; the reporting fashions need to become more flatter, more horizontal than vertical and I say this with this example:  the enforcement nucleus from within the Council represent he various departments, we have the Zoning and Planning Department; Sanitation Inspectors, Health Inspectors, Traffic Wardens, Valuation etc.  I am saying maybe the time has come, and I will further the discussion at the Council – we need to centralize enforcement – we need to restructure/right size the Council so that if it is that we will have the right individuals in the right place with the right aptitude to do the enforcement, they must have certain prerequisites and meet certain criteria.  After right size and restructuring, we zone them in these areas and they do report writing.  For example, when the Valuation Officers go out maybe there might be an infraction that is happening that affects another department – so what will now be done or the idea is I must be able to issue a ticket if you’re littering; I must say to you if you’re building improperly you must cease and desist; it is that if there is any valuation issue we look at it holistically and at the end of the day we have the proper report writing of these personnel and again it has to be uniformed as a municipal enforcement agency and this is the idea of which I spoke about this morning on the talk shows to give that presence that we want a better Belize and in attaining that, yes we need to step up enforcement and I believe this is opportune time and the right avenue to do such.  It has been tested in one department; it has come up with Councilor Colleagues and so forth.  So now it is to ideally look at if the Council wants to proceed, we proceed but my purpose of saying this or calling in the talk shows to make the position, as politicians or elected officials, you hear the concerns of your constituents, you look at the situation, you analyze it; you form a consensus, inclusion, discussion and then based on that, this is my response to all those concerns where concerns pertain to enforcement and that is the idea that will be shared with the Council in moving Belize City forward, at least in concept and idea and we will see how it works, if it can work, if it is doable and we go this route.  Blocking up the drains and when it rains, it floods and affects my neighborhood and community – I am saying no.  I am saying that when the zones that are looked at could be created, I am saying holistically, if I am a Valuation officer and I see you building a fence contrary to the law and I have the Special Constable training and the all the prerequisite training to say that I have the right to issue you a ticket because you are not abiding by the law.  I as this individual within a municipal enforcement unit would have such right to give you a ticket.  As is right now, the Valuation officer cannot come to you and give you a ticket and like I said it reduces the vertical construct of an organization, it becomes flatter, you have more persons on the ground and you have a better view of enforcement of which we need.  So I’m saying, in a sense we are removing the walls that separate departments, we are centralizing enforcement, even if they have to be uniformed to a certain extent so that people see someone in authority and they must be Special Constable trained and they have to be sworn in by the court because as is people have to issue summons but only someone of the court can issue a summons and we do have a Municipal Court.  So, I’m saying that this individual with all the requisite training can execute within a zone or an area or collectively as one person representing all these departments”

Willoughby says that if all the procedures are followed, then the changes, if implemented as proposed, should not create any headaches.

PHILIP WILLOUGHBY

City Councilor

Belize City Council

“My hope that we centralize all of what is enforcement and those are the people who will execute on behalf of the Belize City Council, not any other member of staff.  This will be presented in the organizational review and the zoning that the Council would want to see providing that they accept this ideology.”

The plan was derived, according to Willoughby, after much study and after listening to the people that voted in the Belize City Council elections.

PHILIP WILLOUGHBY

City Councilor

Belize City Council

“Listening through the various social media, talk shows, listening to your constituents on the ground of which we represent – we have always heard people saying what about enforcement and why is it so lacking?  What is it that we can and will we be doing about it?  So I looked at various states to see how they have executed these duties, and said why not try it here but if we need to tweak, we tweak it differently and implement it with the supporting legislations which we will probably need.”

Willoughby expects to present his plan to the Council at the next caucus this week.

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