If you've been getting the impression that Belize City Mayor Darrell Bradley won't be retreating quietly from the spotlight - you're probably right. He's in his last few weeks in office, and he's been very busy recently, making the rounds on the news and talk show circuit. And today - at the end of his 6 years in office - he held a press conference, calling it an exit interview. Now we've already done what we thought was an exit interview where he gave himself a grade, but that was just a soundbyte. At today's event., Bradley reviewed the broad sweep of his six years in office, and candidly discussed accomplishments and shortcoming. The first thing he pointed to was a lack of maintenance of the city's infrastructure:...
Darrell Bradley- Mayor of Belize City
"You would have heard us emphasize the issue of infrastructure spending but I am still very much concerned that the City Council was not able sufficiently, to my satisfaction, to put in place proper maintenance and monitoring mechanisms to make sure that what we build we can maintain. So that, what I think or what I would recommend is that there should be a focused discussion on maintenance and monitoring, that we should put in place systems including plans and operational plans that ensure that we maintain our proper infrastructure. I get text all the time, 'Mayor, you cemented the street but at the intersection, there is a big pothole. Why don't you fix that?' And routinely I would text the City Administrator or a technical staff to wonder: if we spend a million dollars on a road, why is it that we would allow a pothole at the intersection? Why would we not ensure, because there has been so much of the public outlay of funds, why would we not ensure that there is maintenance and monitoring system in place so that people should not have those potholes."
Jules Vasquez - Reporter
"While you are, and the record shows, that you are great at being driven, you are perhaps not so great at the finer details. If you had known then what you know now about the devil in those details, such as a thing called psi per square inch concrete streets, would you have proceeded with a greater sense of caution?"
Darrell Bradley
"No, and the reason why I would say no is for this- and first of all I accept your point that my personality and my leadership style is not somebody to be involved in details, I actually don't like meetings or the day to day grind of municipal government. But I think that there is always a leader for a time and there is always a person for a time. And I think you needed a mayor at that time who would have had a shock effect, so to speak."
Jules Vasquez
"Because of that particular style of driving forward without perhaps paying attention to the exacting engineering specifications of pounds per square inch, that sort of thing, do you feel a way now that some of the first streets you've paved, let's look at Cemetery Road going into Orange Street it is in a state, I mean, that is part of your legacy as well."
Darrell Bradley
"Yes, you take the good with the bad. I can say that more than 90% of what we built is perfect and will last a significant period of time. There are, as you point out, parts of it that have failed and I will take responsibility for that."
Mayor Bradley also discussed the issue of accountability - or the lack of it. He admits that his council needed to do more with this:
Darrell Bradley - Mayor of Belize City
"I think that there needs to be more focused attention to ensure that municipal government is transparent and accountable. Again, we have done much on this. I will harken to our audit exercise that is carried out once every year and we publish that report. Minutes of our council meetings are made public. Every six weeks we have public meetings in various parks and public buildings. We have had a public policy of disclosure, no one from the media can ever say that I have refused an interview because I believe that government is about answering to members of the public but we need to go in more strategic areas. I am concerned that many times when we do contracts, for example, City Council contracts are still not tendered to the extent that they need to be but I think that there is much more that needs to be done in the area of strengthening public confidence in the administration of government."
Jules Vasquez - Reporter
"For someone who has nothing to hide, no contract is posted on that site on all those civil works you've done."
Darrell Bradley
"We've never done that though."
Jules Vasquez
"Yes, but I am saying you said you would and you didn't. That is very elementary to do if you have nothing to hide."
Darrell Bradley
"I recognize that there were ways that we could have improved but we improved when there were more checks and balances. One of the things which I always appreciate you for Jules and the members of the media always is that you make it about issues. That is a very legitimate point that we should strive for ways to improve our record keeping."
And, as he demits office, the Mayor leaves a council with a huge wage bill and considerable debt. It's also a council for which he has opened no significant new streams of revenue - despite floating the idea of a garbage tax:
Darrell Bradley- Mayor of Belize City
"This City Council has not brought on stream any new revenue source. You would have seen earlier on that we looked at some of the residential garbage fees. That is something that I believe in but because of our consultations and for whatever reason we abandoned that. You would have seen that I would have agitated for a toll on the Northern Highway, I still believe in that. But for whatever reason, those plans were abandoned. The point that I am making is that we have to look at ways that we can enhance revenue to ensure that we are able to deliver the kind of vision that we want to do for residents. People want drains but drains cost money. They want streets but streets cost money. How can you expect we would provide those goods and services if there is only so much in relation to the tax base?"
Jules Vasquez
"As you leave the council it is the costliest most debt-saddled council in history."
Darrel Bradley
"No, I would actually dispute what you have said. This council is, I don't want to say debt free because no government is debt free, but this council is the most debt responsible council in modern day. Everything that I have borrowed for I can show you were you have benefitted. What I am saying is that the new council will inherit a fiscally responsible council, it will inherit a council that will have much less debt that I inherited and it will have a council that can show record of performance, that the new mayor will sit on a building that he did not build, that we labored to build and that office will be a nice office."
And, that new Mayor, whoever he is, will have bi weekly headaches trying to figure out how to meet payroll. That's because the council was more or less forced to take on all 150 BML employees after it did not renew the private sanitation company's contract. The Mayor didn't want to take them on when the switchover was made in January 2015 - and, 3 years later he still sticks to his guns that it was a bad decision:..
Darrell Bradley - Mayor of Belize City
"I could not have taken on those people. 150 persons actually almost doubled our wage bill. Every single two weeks we look at something like $330 thousand dollars in salaries and that doesn't take into account pension and social security and income tax and all of those things, so that when you double that wage bill for something that I can't see that there is a real tangible benefit I would say that that would be a waste. I was reminded and persuaded that there are some humanitarian considerations and if I did not have to pay that amount right now I would tell you that instead of 155 streets we could have had maybe 300 streets."
Jules Vasquez
"So, it is a decision that you regret?"
Darrell Bradley
"It is not a decision that I regret because leadership is about a team. I mean, I am mindful of the fact that today is Valentine's Day and a marriage is about partnerships and compromise, so that, I may have had an opinion but I am guided by 11 people in a council so that my vote is only one vote."
The former BML - now City Council employees - have gotten three raises since coming over to city hall.
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