Baynes: Cepep restructuring 80% complete

The vacant Community-Based Environmental Protection and Enhancement Programme (Cepep) positions at the Tobago House of Assembly (THA) Division of Community Development, Youth Development and Sport are closer to be filled, according to the division’s secretary, Terance Baynes.

Speaking with Newsday on Friday, Baynes said the process is 80 per cent complete.

“Three project support officers and 15 district officers have already been engaged, we have four more positions are to be filled.”

He said he was told that the remaining positions should be filled by the end of March, for a full complement of 24 staff members.

In July 2022, the workers at Cepep received their termination letters signed by then administrator of the division Earland Kent.

The letters said, “The Cepep programme is a national social mechanism aimed at providing short-term to medium-term employment for semi-skilled and unskilled persons within their neighbourhoods.”

It said that the THA had cause to review the operation and administration of the programme, noting that previous reviews were done in 2008 and 2012.

It said in the most recent review, 2022, issues of duplication of functions between the different categories of staff, irreconcilable remuneration packages, a distortion of the reporting relationship with the programme, and the obsolescence of certain positions, among other anomalies, were discovered.

As a result, it said, the THA had to revise the organisational structure of the programme for optimum efficiency and service delivery and all contract positions had been made redundant.

Baynes had said that staff who received termination letters were free to reapply.