Clean up your mess - Solid waste fees coming for event promoters

Event promoters might soon have to fork out a fee to the National Solid Waste Management Authority (NSWMA) to clean up after events.

Audley Gordon, executive director at the NSWMA told THE WEEKEND STAR that the plans are in its embryonic stages but they will soon come to fruition.

“A lot of these promoters just keep them party and move on, without due concern for the solid waste that is left behind, and we are saying we have a duty to clean up. And if we don’t clean up, we will be held accountable,” Gordon said, while noting that he is aware that there are responsible promoters who make arrangements for clean-up exercises.

“We believe that the better way to do it, is to have an arrangement in place where, instead of us having to do this clean up, and no way of getting the compensation, that we would have an arrangement made before the event," he said.

Gordon envisions that when a promoter goes to the police and municipal council for permits, there is a fee that they pay to the councils that would include the solid waste component.

"(Therefore) we would not have an argument. We would just clean up, because you would have already paid your fee,” Gordon said.

He did not indicate how such fees would be calculated, or a timeline for when the policy will be implemented, but noted that it would be put in place soon.

Romaine 'Luigi' Brown, promoter of Allure and Day Break said he already pays a company for clean-up exercises, so he would be in general support of NSWMA’s policy once it is reasonable.

“If it’s as simple as they provide us with an economic package, then I have no issue. If I have to pay my company then turn around and still have to pay an additional fee for NSWMA, then I would find it hard to support. But if the NSWMA offers a reasonable cost to do what I pay my clean-up company, then I would support,” he said.

Julian Lee of Jamaica Carnival told THE WEEKEND STAR, “We don’t have an objection to this being implemented because these are things that we do, and elements that we take into consideration.