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**Lazie** · September 9, 2008, 11:36 AM

Tourism ministry spends millions on unoccupied building

Since March of this year, the tourism ministry has been paying $700,000 monthly for a rented premises that remains unoccupied at the newly constructed Praise Concourse complex on Queens Drive in Montego Bay, St. James.

So far, over $3 million has been paid out for the property overlooking the Sangster International Airport and owned by motor vehicle spare parts dealer, Owen Tibby.

The tourism ministry will not be occupying the premises, which was rented to relocate its western offices, until after November.
It has, however, been rented all this time at a cost of US$17 per square foot, plus US$2 per square foot for maintenance and security.
Tourism Minister, Edmund Bartlett, and his Permanent Secretary, Jennifer Griffith, are blaming the delay on government bureaucracy.

“I’m frustrated by the procurement system. I had hoped we would have moved into the building by July, but we have to follow the guidelines set by the Government Procurement Procedures for Contracts. Admittedly, the process is taking far too long. We are not happy, but the fault is not with the tourism ministry,” Bartlett explained.

He said the main cause for the delay was the snail’s pace at which the relevant authorities were moving to procure furniture and refurbish the building to make it suitable for accommodating the offices. The minister pointed to the long time it took the National Works Agency (NWA) to prepare tender document and analyse tenders and recommendations from sector committees regarding the internal work to be done to the building.
“We took all the reasonable steps we can to have the building ready by July, but this just was not possible, but I do agree with you that renting premises and not occupying it is money wasted,” the tourism minister conceded.

According to the permanent secretary, “The Praise Concourse Complex was the only building we could find suitable to our liking. MoBay doesn’t have much office space and this was the one recommended by the National Land Agency, which did a due diligence on the available properties.”

For several years the tourism ministry’s western offices were housed at the Cornwall Beach Complex, on Gloucester Avenue - Montego Bay’s ‘hip strip’, where the cost of rental was low. That premises was owned by the St. James Parish Council and was leased to the Tourism Product Development Company (TPDCo) at a nominal rate.

Minister Bartlett said he was not aware that the premises was later sold to someone with political connections to the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP).
Since taking office, Bartlett has decided to centralise the operations of the regional staff of the ministry and its agencies. This move, he argued, would give the ministry a strong presence in the premier tourism resort, thereby allowing industry players access to product and quality advice, training, marketing and visitor services.

The minister and his permanent secretary promised to expedite the relocation exercise, saying that in the long run, the public would be better off since there would be significant savings.
Griffith said the current space was much larger than at the previous location, and would prevent agencies like TPDCo from having to rent hotel space when it is having internal and external training programmes.

http://www.sunheraldja.com/article/show/1523

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