Funding from Government for the dredging in the Belize Harbour has been approved and works are to start very soon. As you heard yesterday, Minister of Tourism Manuel Heredia and State Minister in Investment Tracey Panton both said that GOB is committed to assisting financially with this major siltation problem, one that has been plaguing the harbor since late last year. Today Belize City Mayor Darrell Bradley told us that it's definitely a go and that these works fall somewhat under one aspect of the Flood Mitigation Project.
Darrell Bradley, Belize City Mayor
"I think the Minister of Tourism, if I'm not mistaken, and Minister Tracy Panton had indicated in relationship to the government's contribution, I think a lot of it has to do with, and I mentioned this before in terms of just finding the finances, that's an amount of money that various government entities don't necessarily have in their budget. I think one of the points that I would want to emphasize is that this is the reason why, in terms of the flood mitigation project, there's a tremendous amount of emphasis on sustainability and maintenance. We are focusing now in the flood mitigation project, part of it is a study of the river maintenance. In terms of insuring that there's a regular budgeted amount for the maintenance of assets that have been emerged. I'm very sad that this is only now coming unfolding because that has been a problem for some time but my understanding is that the Ministry of Finance has already approved the money. There was a dredge out there for 2 days so we are understanding that the project will start very shortly."
Again, no set date or time was given as to when dredging will actually start - but at least there is a dredge in the harbour. We will keep following this dredging project.
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