Pensioner: Diego corporation must do better

“MY YARD has become like a swamp and a breeding ground for only mosquitoes.” This was the cry of 67-year-old John Geetooah who has been pleading with the Diego Martin Regional Corporation to have the drains cleaned and garbage picked up on time in font his home.

Speaking to Newsday at his home yesterday at Jellicoe Street, Carenage, John said he has been battling with the issue for the past eight years and to date the situation has only got worse. He said last week with all the heavy rain, his family was marooned and could not leave the house for two days because the amount of water running from the drain into his yard made leaving the house impossible.

“I am fed up. This is not getting better at all. Every time it rains and the water settles, it has nowhere else to go and flows through my yard. Look at the colour of the water. This is madness. I have children in the yard and it is not a good sight at all.

“The children can get sick. the garbage is left for days without no pick-up and it’s placed right next to my home. I have called the corporation on several occasions and no one is coming to clean the drain or try to solve the problem. I don’t know how to turn again.

“Thank God a part of the yard has concrete that I can walk around the house. The water is just coming in and settling in my yard. The corporation has to do better than that.”

Chairman of the Diego Martin Regional Corporation Susan Hong said that the contractor for the area has handled picking up garbage poorly within that community. She said residents of Carenage should not have an issue of big heaps of garbage during the week because the contractors are being paid to pick it up three days a week.

She also said, “We need people to call our health department at 632-0713 or 637-8072 to make an official report, because if they do not, we will not know what is taking place. There is a breakdown somewhere and we need to deal with it.

“We cannot be paying contractors to pick up garbage three days a week and people are left with huge piles of garbage in front of their properties.” She also promised to look into having the drains cleaned.”