The Tribune

By YOURI KEMP

Tribune Business Reporter

ykemp@tribunemedia.net

Six fire-ravaged Potter’s Cay vendors still need the extra $48,000 previously set aside for waterside pilings so they can reconstruct their decks, their Association president said yesterday.

Wendi Constantine, the Bahamas Dock and Allied Venues Vendors Association (BDAVVA) president, told Tribune Business this sum had been set aside for such work by the former Minnis administration in its efforts to assist those whose stalls were destroyed by fire last year.

The funds, she added, were left at FYP Builders Mall together with a further $96,000 for rebuilding the stalls landside. However, Clay Sweeting, minister of agriculture, marine resources and Family Island affairs, said earlier this week that the vendors must get approval from the Department of Environmental Planning and Protection (DEPP) for the pilings - a process that will take some time to obtain approval.

Ms Constantine, though, said: “There are other ways to put down the deck instead of piling into the sand. This is unacceptable, and Potter’s Cay Dock is not an environment for take-away. The culture is to sit down, and he said nothing about DEPP approval in all of these meetings. When we got the plans last week we were shocked.

“The previous government left $96,000, and that’s for the material, at FYP (Builders Mall), which comes to about $16,000 per person, along with $48,000 for the piling. Altogether they left $144,000. This administration is not even trying to help us. We already had approvals for decks. The deck is the floor of your building, and without the deck we are only left with the little piece of the sidewalk. You can’t hold stoves and equipment in the back of that.

“We need those decks,” Ms Constantine added. “I spoke to Commander Wright (head of the Port Department) and he admitted that it takes about eight months to a year for this committee and, even after it meets, it doesn’t mean that you will get approval.

“Also, you cannot build on the side of the road and then add a deck. The deck is the floor and it needs to make one continuous flow or else it will not line up. So you can’t come back one year later and put in the floor. That cannot work. You have to build the sides of your building on to that deck which is attached to your building.”

The BDAVVA covers the Potter’s Cay vendors, Western Esplanade, Cabbage Beach and Farmers Market vendors, where Ms Constantine added: “Dealing with the Ministry of Works and the permanent secretary there, Luther Smith, is like night and day when dealing with other ministries. He has been helpful with getting the vendors on the Western Esplanade water, and Ministry of Works seems to be the only ministry that is doing moving something along for my vendors.”