HDC chair plans to keep vow to Real Spring residents

CHAIRMAN of the Housing Development Corporation (HDC) Noel Garcia has told residents of Real Spring, Valsayn, he will be keeping his promise to address their flooding concerns.

Speaking with the media after his re-appointment at the HDC’s South Quay head office on Tuesday, Garcia said he was waiting for the dry season before meeting with a technical team from the Ministry of Works and Transport.

Last November Garcia told Newsday the flooding that had affected the community was going to be the last it experienced. He promised a berm and retaining wall would be built, and the St Joseph river, which borders the area, would be dredged. He said just as Greenvale has never had a repeat of the disastrous flooding of 2018, neither would Real Spring after the HDC’s intervention.

Asked for a follow-up on his promise on Tuesday, Garcia said: “I intend, as soon as the Carnival season is complete, to hold talks with the technical team at the Ministry of Works so we can carry out that promise that I made. Some people said that said I was brave to make such a promise, but it is better to live in hope than to die in despair.

He added: “The residents of Real Spring are in need of some kind of relief, because to go through that ritual of annual flooding and to do nothing, really, is unacceptable. So I will carry out my promise and I will work closely with the Ministry of Works to ensure that that promise is fulfilled.”