Corporation to blame...but register properly

JOINING deputy Port of Spain Mayor Hillan Morean in his call to Woodbrook business owners to ensure their properties are registered as businessplaces, if commerce is taking place therein, Woodbrook Residents’ Association head, Lynette Dolly, said people who operate businesses out of residences must notify the City Corporation.

In the same breath, the association head also knocked the corporation for letting this issue fester and get out of hand in the first place.

“In Woodbrook, a lot of residences have been changed to commercial,” Dolly said. “Properties have also been sold. It is not that residents have businesses operating out of them, it is that the whole building has gone commercial.”

At a statutory meeting earlier this week, Morean said several properties were registered by owners as residential but in reality were operating as commercial entities.

He slammed these property owners as stealing money from the corporation by way of not paying utilities at commercial rates and other commerce taxes. He threatened to revoke these owners’ leases if they do not register properly.

In response, Dolly pointed out that several Carnival bands set up their mas camps out of residential homes and commerce takes place. She said other houses have boutiques, food outlets and other forms of business. She said in many instances, the owners have not informed the corporation about commercial activity taking place there.

“Take Rosalino Street,” she said, “Go and see how many homes have been converted to businesses. I am sure if you check with the corporation, you will see that half of them have not been registered as businesses.”

Dolly said that along with registering as a business place with the corporation, owners of these businesses are also mandated to petition Town and Country, as well as neighbours in the area, to get permission to run their business. Dolly said not even those things are being done.

She said that there are some owners who have registered properly and are paying both residential and commercial rates since parts of their homes have been converted for commercial purposes. But these honest people in Woodbrook are in the extreme minority.

But who is ultimately to blame for this? Dolly believes it is the corporation, since for donkey years, no due diligence has been done to ascertain which property owner is in violation of their deed or leases. She said a property verification exercise started recently by the corporation has come decades too late. For this, she termed the City Corporation as “slack.”

Residents who spoke with Newsday lamented that in the 1970s and 80s, they fought tooth and nail when they realised that more and more businesses were springing up in their quiet, laid back community. In the end, businesses won, but the corporation is not getting its just dues.

A Woodbrook resident said illegal conversion from home to business has been rampant and he is sure not many of these businessowners are paying commercial utility rates and other taxes to the corporation. As he spoke in front of his home, on the wall on which the resident leaned on, was a sign saying a – a hair salon – was open for business.