Premier’s office silent on dump deal
(CNS): The contract signed by the former administration with the Dart Group for the proposed solution to Cayman’s long-running waste-management issues remains stalled. Despite repeated requests by CNS for information from the premier’s office about the current status of the proposals for the George Town landfill and the waste-to-energy facility, the government has remained silent.
Meanwhile, sources close to the talks have told us that the current administration has serious concerns about the deal signed by the Unity government on the eve of the April 2021 elections.
In a report by the Office of the Auditor General (OAG), which was recently leaked to the press, Auditor General Sue Winspear raised concerns about the previous administration committing to major, legally binding agreements so close to an election.
Writing in the report, Dubai Expo and Overseas Offices, which focused heavily on the former premier’s ministry of trade, which no longer exists, she noted that global best practice limits civil servants from committing to major expenditures or novel projects in the immediate run-up to elections for the simple and obvious reason that the incumbent administration could lose and the policies overturned.
She pointed out that the ReGen contract, the term used for the latest government-Dart deal, was signed a mere three weeks before the election. Although there was a fallback date for finalising the contract, the PPM-led Unity government committed the current administration to a policy that may not fit with its stated agenda of sustainability.
Almost a year after that deal was signed on 26 March 2021, PACT and, in particular, Premier Wayne Panton, who has taken control of the project, has said very little about the deal and the current administration’s policy toward this literally ‘burning’ issue.
The most recent mention was in the Cabinet notes for the 14 December meeting, when the government approved a guarantee of payment for the remediation work that Dart continues to undertake at the site of the current landfill.
The last time Panton spoke publicly about the dump was in a statement issued in October, when he raised some non-specific concerns about the deal and its complexities.
He also noted the ambitious timeline and said that the government had “not rushed blindly” to sign off on it. “This project is simply far too important, in addition to being very complex, to make any hasty or half-informed decisions,” he said at the time, stressing that, despite the concerns, the project was not dead.
But more than six months later, there is still no comment from the government about the talks.
However, Dart continues with the remediation work, and shortly after Panton’s statement confirmed the terms of reference for the EIA. Richard McAree, Dart’s environmental social governance programme manager, said during last year’s health conference that the EIA would go to public consultation this year. In a release on the ReGen website posted in November, the organisation said it expected the EIA work to take around ten months.
- Fascinated
- Happy
- Sad
- Angry
- Bored
- Afraid
Category: Environmental Health, Health
Under the PPP model Dart is to foot the bill for construction. So what is PACT waiting for? By the time that plant is built it there will have been elections. So need to worry about current budget. PACT can have cover by kicking the can down the road.
How about a WTF plant? Much more Caymanian.
In the U.S., at least 31 municipal solid waste incinerators closed between 2000 and 2020, largely due to the financial burden caused by necessary pollution control requirements.
https://zerowasteworld.org/wp-content/uploads/The-High-Cost-of-Waste-Incineration-March-30.pdf
Trash Incineration is the Most Expensive Way to Make Energy
https://www.energyjustice.net/incineration/expensive-energy
The development of waste-to-energy facilities encounters some problems. One of the biggest among them is the cost of an incineration plant. There are so many fairy tales about this business, so many fantastic technologies offered at very low prices. This creates wrong expectations of clients concerning price level. A client should recognize the average price level in the industry before commencing the project.
https://wteinternational.com/news/cost-of-incineration-plant/
How long do politicians have to keep on promising heaven and delivering hell before people catch on, and stop getting swept away by rhetoric?
Should have just stopped the headline at “Premier’s office silent….
Our ‘Transparent’ government is one of the most non-transparent in my lifetime, and I am 50! The level of shadiness is Putin-ess. Closing roads with no Public notice. Crazy PCR rules, picking and choosing who is or is not allowed to prosper government makes me vomit in my mouth.
Where’s WALL-E?
They don’t have money for it. Saunders spent it all on school lunches.
When there is silence is because money is talking and monkeys dancing
Premier cannot do anything unless his McBuddy says so!
PACT – “Transparant,” I think not.
Remember years ago when Dart offered to take care of all this for free in Boddentown? But yeah, let’s not do anything hasty.
Not free. They were going to help build the road and donate a section of their land for a lined facility they would operate for profit.
Here is sad truth, Dart will have a waste to energy plant that requires garbage at the dump location next to his CAMANA BAY conglomerate with mafia club housing.
So, we will pay Govt garbage fees still, but only for the Govt to collect the garbage and deliver to his location, for him to then turn it to energy & turn back around to charge us out the wah-zoo just like CUC is currently…
P.s. – Remember who won the only BID ever in history to compete with CUC local power lines – you guessed it DECCO (Dart) a few years back!
What the hell are you babbling about?
Not sure you’re correct on that. If you are, which I doubt, please post link to where this information can be found. Searched but can’t find it, and never had knowledge of such grant to Dart.
why do i have the distinct impression this will never get solved ? Every single administration has been dancing the one step forward , two steps backwards over the very same issue just to extract more monies from a single investor . There are other jurisdictions other than ours who would welcome their vision with open hearts and arms. Cayman is just a few steps away from either the Bahamas without the extent of territory or Jamaica without a resilient agriculture.
Clearly the comments of a carpet bagger with no knowledge of the success of this country in both the fields of tourism and finance prior to the arrival of this “single investor” hell bent on putting profits ahead of community. Many billionaires had bolt holes in Cayman before the styrofoam man deserted the country of his birth for reasons of financial gain the difference being they had no desire to exploit the local economy for personal gain. They respected and appreciated the charm of Cayman sadly we now have concrete tunnels.
Rubbish
Don’t worry because when Sir Alden and the PPM takes back control he will fast track all deals with the Dart group. He knows they are the best thing that has ever happened to Cayman and that they will solve all problems. This is just a minor delay by people who know their days are numbered.
PPM not getting back into power. They are worse than Dart.
The only person that I can recall, who came out of PPM unscathed ethically, was Marco Archer.
And, in classic PPM style, they let their MVP get away. Blame Alden, once again, for that failure.
This is true. Although PACT is no prize, they are not oppressive to the Caymanian people like PPM.
In all fairness, however, PPM have spent and PACT are spending the money like they won the lottery or are playing with Monopoly $.
It’s actually at the point now, ironically, where PPM and PACT are making MacKeeva’s spending habits (as UDP leader) look like fiscal responsibility.
There is no way that we can sustain another Government that is so spendthrift heavy and gives away all these concessions to super wealthy developers, etc.
What we need is a change: a “real alternative” to the same old power hungry faces, who promise the world, but deliver very little to nothing.
It’s time for a real changing of the guard. We need bright, brave and honest leaders, who have vision, integrity and the guts to do the right thing (even if it’s unpopular).
At least tell us what exactly is the holdup.
My guess is the cost to the country over the 25 year project. We may be willing to pay it to get a real viable solution for our waste problem.
It is astronomically expensive if do it right. The ongoing cost of maintenance and safety of the WtE plant, if built, would bankrupt Cayman.
If left, this mess will bankrupt Cayman anyway with associated health costs/public liability and the loss of tourism dollars as a result of the complete destruction of the North Sound.
Pick your poison Sherlock.
yep…bottom line….a population of 70k does not produce enough trash to make it viable. Insiders have known this since day 1.
How do you know that, 4:11 pm? Maybe if they would quit taking the moolah for themselves, our government could cope with it..
The deal that was signed ‘on the eve of the election’ was something that had been hashed out over many months of negotiations. If it was a good deal then the current Government should be adult enough to say so, and ratify it so we can get on with sorting this big pile of shtuff out. If the agreement needs amending, or adding to then just say so. We don’t need to know any more than that, but for someone that touted transparency as being important, then only engaging with marl road to get the message out, they aren’t doing a very good job.
Hashed out over years not months but agree with everything else. Unfortunately the loss of Peter Ranger was huge but miss ahearn needs to massively and urgently step up and do the right thing for the country and get this project done rather than bury her head in the sand.
That office is silent on everything. I dont even know if they are still on island anymore smh. This is the worst government I’ve ever witnessed. They hide from the people that voted for them. I hope you are paying attention.
How easy people forget the the disasters that was PPM giveaways and lack of transparency from 2013-2021.
It is arguable they were worst and more reckless than McKeeva, Juliana’s & CG’s UDP government of 2009-2013 which is difficult to imagine.
However, Alden Moses and KT told us they were better than UDP jumped into bed with McKeeva then got involved in the same scams and mismanagement of everything.
The only thing worse than those political parties is the mess and waste produced by the civil service led by nice guy the DG that compounds the incompetence and waste at the highest levels with no accountability.
Correct.
Do we have a Premier anyway?
Do we need any of them?
Panton needs to remind us again what the “T” purportedly stood for on “PACT”?
Just like their infrequent updates on COVID protocols (or more information on cruise ship commencement)…
There is no “T” in UDP.
This PACK is now between A Rock and A Hard Place. That is what happens when the mantra is “Being the government at any cost. You all need to govern instead of spending the next 3 years criticizing the past. Show us the plan! Show us what all the strategizing was all about! An entire year has gone already. Be the remedy you said you would be. On another note, enquiring minds want to know if all the permits that were turned down were filled by Caymanians? Just asking for my kindergarten grandson.
Panton need to remind is what “P”, “A”, “C” and “T” are, because there is a real disconnect from what I was told.
With PACT there is certainly, most of all, no transparency and no competency.
PACT also fails not much, if any accountability.
PACT is not people driven, but might be Lodge driven.
Nothing complicated about dumps or waste to energy. Just hire a real company like Waste Management etc who can actually deliver proven technology. You do have to tell them where to put it, and you have to fend off all the consultants, fixers, cousins, political subcontractors, and the like. That’s why you get the big bucks.
ppm idiots turned down a free solution years ago just because of few votes from backward bodden towners…..zzzzzzzz
If you mean the Dart BT dump, it wasn’t free. Not in full-cost terms. And it wasn’t complete. It was a magician’s trick that fooled some people into thinking they were offering a free solution to an expensive problem.
Better than not fixing the dump for this many more years? Perhaps. But not a ‘free solution’.
Suggest you review the so called “solution”. Some land and a few lined holes is not a solution in my opinion. Regardless of location.
Exactly! It was a few cistern sized holes, lined with something(probably plastic) . Was far from being any kind of landfill. Everyone who protested against it had every right to. Bodden Town residents definitely did not want that in our area and will protest against it again and again.
It wasn’t an all inclusive solution like Regen. The proposal was to merely create a lined cell in order to start what would have become another dump like the one in GT. Dart essentially presented a carrot on a stick, even though there’s a donkey elected in BT not all donkeys fall for a fake carrot on a stick.
Calling the proposal to move the dump to BT a solution smells like the kind of propaganda that a Dart vested employee spews. Like I said he just wanted it and stills wants it out of his backyard.
Basically right, but nobody was “moving” anything. Too many people think the proposal was to actually move the GT landfill to Bodden Town, when in fact the proposal was to cap the current landfill (which is happening right now) and create a new lined landfill in BT. But, as has been said, it wasn’t a full solution like ReGen.
Children, Who pitched their tents at the foot of Mount Thrashmore? Hands fly up, me teacher, me teacher! I know the answer! Moving it to Bodden Town was to be the proverbial ” out of sight, out of mind”
Can’t blame the PPM for the Bodden town nimby idiots.
Yes you can because, if it wasn’t for how bad PPM was for two terms, the PACT might not have been formed.
The Caymanian people wanted change, but we didn’t get “real change”. We got duped.
We have to wait until 2025 for real change to come. Panton thinks he can run Cayman like the managing partner of a law firm would.
Yea 6 pits in the ground only 3 were to be lined and when the time came to use the other 3 the cost to line them wasn’t covered.
The same backwards idiots who voted for Saunders and Seymour
mount thrashmore…the perfect monument to the incompetence of local mla’s over the last 40 years.
And still the perfect visual for all those cruise ships coming to our shores.
Cayman government is grossly incompetent.
yep …bordering on criminal.
any comment mr governor?
Yes, they are incompetent! I don’t see how they could get much worse. The biggest negative is the greed of human beings. After they get all they can, there isn’t enough left for needed projects! Are there any honest and reliable people anywhere in the Caymans?
Just the type of openness and transparency that we should expect from our elected leadership.
It is my opinion that no group is better than the other and that most people within the groups are living with narcissistic personality disorder and are truly just looking out for themselves.
There was an interesting article on the internet the other day showing in detail that, irrespective of which group of politicians get elected, the majority of people are never truly represented. It is really just the big money donors and big corporate entities that get some level of representation.
Very true of PPM and PACT. In fact, as farfetched as it might sound, Mac was more loyal to the Caymanian people.
As bad as it sounds, it’s the truth. That’s why next election, in 2025, we need a “real alternative”.
If the young Caymanian professionals and couple of older, experienced Caymanian veterans actually run, we will have the best Government ever in the history of the Cayman Islands.
Things need to change. Time for real Caymanian leaders to step up to your he plate and steer Cayman back on track. No more Lodge favoritism. That has to stop.
I agree just get on with finalizing REGEN. Things take way too long to finish in Cayman (unless it has to do with real estate and construction for homes… then it passes and gets through in months). But if it is something good for the environment and will create jobs it’s delay, delay, delay.
Tired of talking about it, it’s time for action and completion!
Just get on with it already. This is the difference between the private and public sector, and DART in particular.
DART will get this done if the political red tape can be eliminated.
Panton just refuses to make a decision as he is handcuffed to 10 different opinions.
The more Dart becomes involved with out infrastructure the more it makes it impossible for him to be controlled. Every government thinks they can take back the power from Dart for the Cayman people but they end up under his thumb and control just like the government before them.
True. But that’s really owing to a lack of sustainable integrity.
Some get power drunk and greedy, despite having good intentions to start with.
We haven’t had good leadership in a long time. Trust me change will come in 2025. Wait and watch.
But didn’t Sir Alden sign a deal just before the election last year?
Sir Alden should be called to account.
Yes, he did. Madam Alden signed it 3 weeks before election.
Good for Sir Alden, at least someone in Authority took a leadership position and dealt with a long outstanding problem.
Talking and talking will not fix the problem, and the UDP delay now is just buying time to find fault with the previous government.
Get on with it and stop looking for the perfect deal…it does not exist.
‘took a leadership position and dealt with a long outstanding problem’
Are you actually bonkers? They literally had YEARS to deal with the dump and did nothing about it meanwhile listening to a handful of NIMBYs in BT. The only thing on Alden’s mind when he signed that deal was to lump PACT with the problem and be able to point the finger later. A classic political tactic as he knew he was getting bombed out of office.
If you can’t/won’t see that then you are a major part of the problem on this island. A solution to the dump problem is another 10 years away guaranteed.
Are you drunk? He only “took action” three weeks before the election, instead of during all his time in office before that. This is not what responsible politicians do.
The point is…he took action which starts the process of dealing with the problem.
Doing nothing won’t achieve anything.
Madam Alden only did tht 3 weeks before the election in a last ditch attempt for him and the PPM to get elected..I’m sure he didn’t even bother to read it in full.
12:08, But Alden conned us. He didn’t deal with the problem.
What did he actually agree to with Dart?
Took action after 30yrs of Govt dealing with it and 42 elewenteen consultant reports.
Way to go Alden…..
So, PPM had had two terms in power.
The agreement with Dart 3 weeks before the last election.
PPM strategically called an early election, because they were so unpopular.
This was done to leverage PPM’s slim chances of regaining power, which failed.
This is not good leadership. This was Alden’s negligence.
Get your facts straight. It all stinks to high heaven.
politrick at its best…