Charlotte Street vendors threaten PNM over vending plan

Charlotte Street vendors are upset and threatening to make the governing PNM pay at the polls next year after the Port of Spain City Corporation approved a Christmas vending plan they describe as "disrespectful."

Corporation officials discussed the plan at its monthly statutory meeting on November 27.

Based on reports from engineers, police and the public health department, the council approved roadside vending from Thursday to Sunday for the first two weeks of December.

For the week December 17-24, vendors will be allowed on the street every day.

The vendors initially asked for vending to be allowed from December 1-24, but deputy mayor Abena Hartley told the council technocrats did not agree with the request.

She said officials considered the volume of people expected in the city during that period, the traffic congestion it is expected to cause, and the safety and security of people in the city.

She added the public health department also considered the street-cleaning requirements while making its recommendation.

Speaking to the media after the meeting, Mayor Chinua Alleyne gave further insight into the decision-making process.

“We take the decision in the context of a request. The vendors association wrote and asked formally for those days. We took a look at the request and asked the public health, city police, and engineering departments to weigh in. Based on the recommendations that have come to us, it is within that context we took a particular decision.

Alleyne said he believed the plan was an agreeable compromise.

“December always has increased activity and it’s a normal thing for us to approve additional days for vending. It is not as many as the association might have asked for, but our responsibility is to make sure we have a medium between providing opportunities for entrepreneurship and making sure we keep the city ordered.”

Vendors, though, disagree and say the plan does not strike enough of a balance.

Speaking with Newsday, several complained the plan only gives them an additional four days to sell their goods for Christmas.

“We does be here from Thursday to Sunday right through anyway. So them first two weeks is nothing different to what we already have. The final week they want to give us is from a Tuesday to a Tuesday so all we getting is four extra days. That is madness.”

Referring to Alleyne as “the grinch,” another vendor described the plan as stingy.

She said there was a stark difference from how they they were treated under former mayor Joel Martinez.

“Martinez used to give us at least two weeks. He was a give-and-take kind of person but it have none of that now. The grinch done gone with it.”

A female vendor added, “We used to get from the middle of December to Christmas Eve and sometimes even till December 31.”

They said sales have been slow and the additional four days is insufficient.

“Watch town. It have nobody here. And they want to give us four days. People have bills to pay.

“This not making sense. Last year it was whole month, but this ent making no f------- sense this year!”

A vendor selling fruits and vegetables said a massive decline in sales means she is sometimes forced to sell her goods cheaper than usual, rather than keep them and see them spoil.

“Look at Charlotte Street right now. It have no shoppers. With all the shootings and crime, it have nobody. I sell $12 worth of goods in the last half hour!”

A man argued the people putting together the recommendations for the council are removed from the situation.

“The City police talking, but you could walk this who street and not see a single city police. Congestion is not a problem either because Town don't have that again. Let the people who saying that, jump in their car and drive to Chaguanas and then tell me about congestion and traffic.”

Another vendor said giving them such a limited schedule for Christmas will only result in increased illegal vending.

“When they do that is the illegal vendors who coming, because police don't come to move them. Look up (the street) and tell me if you seeing any police?”

The vendors called on the Prime Minister to intervene and said failure to do so could come with a political price.

“Is that how they treat their supporters from this area? This is an election year. How they could do that? They need to have a heart and some understanding.

“This council not appealing to black voters and the urban population in this area. Plenty of the vendors from around here and they treating we rough. That is wickedness!”

A nearby vendor chimed in saying, “Yeah for real. The government had ask us to bear with them, and we want them to bear with us now, so we could provide for our family, pay our bills and have a good Christmas.

“Things real hard. Rowley need to talk to the Mayor and let him give us more time. We don't mind getting the second and third week from December 10-24, but that what they give us is not enough.”