Dawn RitchIT PAINS me to say it, but the Mayor of Kingston is a pompous ass and a bully.
As far as anyone can make head or tail of anything, or who is in charge of what, Desmond McKenzie's occupancy of the Mayor's parlour has had a disastrous effect upon the good order of downtown Kingston.
One of the first things he did was to paint a parking space for himself on the road outside his office. He put it on the left hand side of Church Street in old style English lettering saying 'Mayor'.
This was particularly irksome because upon taking office, McKenzie enforced all the no-parking areas in downtown Kingston. He erected signs not just on the main roads, but there is no parking of any kind permitted in the lanes any longer.
Parking is, therefore, at a premium and there is none after 7:30 a.m. After that, you have to pay $100 at a private car park, or $80 at a public one.
PARKING FOR HIMSELF
Since the enforcing new Mayor took office, you can count on spending nearly $500 just to park every week.
Who can afford that just for the privilege of going to work every day? Least of all drivers struggling to keep gas in the car, and fainting away at the pump every week.
In due course, the Mayor proceeded to mark out yet more parking for himself and another official on the opposite side of the road on Church Street. That's two more parking spaces denied the public. This is grotesque and excessive.
His Worship the Mayor, along with the deputy mayor, the town clerk, the city engineer and the city treasurer and 11 other KSAC officials already have covered parking garages with their names on them on the same property where they work.There is no need, therefore, for the Mayor to have parking directly outside his front door, when his private KSAC parking is right beside him. But there was more to come.
DISABLED
All of a sudden the top and bottom of every block was designated for the disabled, and wheel-chair ramps chipped into the sidewalk and painted blue.I would like to bet the Mayor that quite so much provision for the disabled with motor cars was unnecessary in downtown Kingston. If every disabled person in the whole island with a car parked in downtown Kingston all day every day, the parking spaces still wouldn't be full.
A couple weeks ago, I parked by mistake in the disabled parking on Church Street. I was glad to see space still available, and didn't notice a new blue sign on a pole beside it. They towed my vehicle the block and a half to the KSAC pound, and the fine was $7,500.
This is not a fine, but a ransom. Indeed even the $5,000 I'd originally been told it was seemed like highway robbery and municipal fraud to me. Which is why I went over to the KSAC and asked to see the Mayor himself.
The Mayor was overseas. What about the Town Clerk? He was overseas with the Mayor, too.
And the City Treasurer? He was out for the day.
So I asked to speak with the person in charge who could deal with a complaint from a member of the public.
I was asked to be seated for 10 minutes, and was seen by a very nice lady. She told me that a notice about the establishment of disabled parking downtown had been put in the paper. I replied that it was nevertheless still very new, and I hadn't yet got accustomed to it.
Moreover the fine was very steep, and I would, therefore, very much appreciate them exercising their discretion, and waiving it. I promised never to do it again. She told me she couldn't waive the wrecker fee, but since I'd reported that nothing at ground level had yet been painted in blue, she would waive the KSAC fine.
PUNITIVE TREATMENT
That was when we both thought it was $1,500. But then I sent for the papers only to discover that the fine was $7,500 because it was an SUV. The wrecker fee remained the same, but the KSAC fine was now $4,000. Especially punitive treatment has, therefore, been reserved for the owners of SUVs.
I went back to the very nice lady at the KSAC. She said that the fine represented revenue to the KSAC, and was prepared to waive only 50 per cent, because she could not have the Mayor return and complain that she had given away the corporation's revenue.
Not only do I find it extortionate to be towed from Church Street to Church Street for the princely sum of $3,500, (it's not even a gallon of gas) but add to that the KSAC's part of the charges, and I feel well and truly gouged.
Motorists have been driven off the curb by a mayor, who then takes more of the curb for himself. Every garage in the extensive KSAC covered parking is free of charge to the Mayor and his officials.
It is full to the brim at all times. It was full on the day the Mayor, the town clerk and the city treasurer were out of town.
So I made some enquiries, only to hear that the KSAC has 40 councillors. I do not know whether this was a reference to Ali Baba and the 40 thieves, or is a real figure. But that is where they park, I was told in the Mayor's garage. How can a Mayor like this attempt to impose order outside when he will not impose it inside?
CASH COW
There are few certainties in life. But one of them is that a policeman, a Parish Councillor, a Member of Parliament and a Mayor never get towed. Bear in mind that the KSAC is cater-corner to the UDC multi-storied parking garage behind the Supreme Court. Why don't they clear out of the Mayor's parking, and park over there?
I would also like him to fix his generator because it is a most intolerable noise nuisance. It's like trying to work directly on top of a jack hammer. Repeated calls to his office have been of no avail.
Some equity ought to be given to taxpayers who, contrary to municipal belief, do not exist merely to serve as a cash cow for salaries in the public sector.
