~ Cooperation a major theme of Minister's visit ~
MARIGOT--French St. Martin's long-term development plan based on the Contrat de Développement between the Collectivité and the State up until 2013 will be launched this summer when the Préfet Délégué receives a formal mandate to negotiate on behalf of the Collectivité and subsequently sign an agreement outlining the State's precise involvement and annual budget.
This was one of the disclosures made by French Minister of Overseas Departments Mme. Marie-Luce Penchard on her first official visit to St. Martin Saturday.
The Contrat de Développement coincides with the European operational plan and paves the way for major infrastructure projects to be executed, such as sewage and drainage, public lighting, development of new technologies, high speed Internet, and projects to enhance social cohesion, to bring the French side "up to par," as President Frantz Gumbs noted.
The minister addressed anticipated issues such as the State's poor performance with recovery of taxes, co-financing concerns and the budget, while also mentioning that illegal employment, social housing, and integration of disadvantaged youth into the work place were other priorities that needed to be addressed further.
During her speech in Hôtel de la Collectivité, she reassured the gathering of elected officials, and indirectly the population, that the State remained committed to assisting the Collectivité through its difficulties.
"The transfer of competences for the new status was complex to execute and these complexities were underestimated," she conceded.
She noted the Collectivité needed more tax revenue to be generated from the public to achieve balanced budgets, and said the adoption of the turnover tax TGCA was a "significant advance." She agreed State Services in St. Martin had underperformed in its collection of taxes to date, and she would see what solutions could be immediately implemented to improve this.
On this point, she said advances made by the State in lieu of tax receipts would continue in 2010, and that reimbursement of the "Dotation de Compensation" (previously overpaid by the State) could be made in instalments.
She described the efforts of law enforcement in security matters on the French side as "remarkable work," but said emphasis must still be put on delinquency prevention. And illegal employment threatened legitimate workers' livelihoods and undermined the economy, she added.
In her first reference to the Dutch side prior to the afternoon meeting with Lt. Governor Franklyn Richards, she said "it is impossible to think of the development of St. Martin without taking into account the Dutch side, and this is why I want to advance a number of dossiers on cooperation."
Speeches were made by the Minister, Senator Louis-Constant Fleming, and President Frantz Gumbs. Just earlier the minister met in private with the Senator and President to discuss shortcomings concerning the judicial system and education administration.
The minister began her visit by inspecting Semsamar's low-income, ownership housing project in French Quarter, where she was briefed by project manager Isabelle Goritsa-Brooks and Semsamar Director General Marie-Paule Belenus-Romana. The State-subsidised, 24-lodging project is budgeted at just over three million euros and offers St. Martiners with low incomes an opportunity to own their own home.
She chatted with two future owners Romeo Chilin and Elise Richardson, who explained that land to build on in St. Martin was too scarce, too expensive, and mostly used for commercial development, while banks were reluctant to grant mortgages on low-income houses. But how this project was negotiated with the various partners, they said, offered them a solution.
While the minister welcomed the project, she said projects such as these warranted further study to prevent a proliferation of buildings that could suffer from neglect and deterioration, and consequently develop into ghetto areas with the crime and delinquency that inevitably followed. Future funding from the State is still to be determined. It was also important to determine specific needs of families when developing these projects, she said.
The entourage visited other project sites in Orient Bay, Hope Estate and Concordia before returning to Hôtel de la Collectivité for the speeches.
In the afternoon, the Minister, Préfet Simonnet and Senator Fleming met with Lt. Governor Franklyn Richards to discuss matters of joint cooperation in areas of policing, customs, justice, waste disposal, health, education, environment, and the minister's proposal to form a mixed commission like the one that exists in French Guiana with Suriname. The minister made it clear that the mixed commission would act as a catalyst to resolve cooperation issues by allowing for joint agreements, which in any event should be accelerated once the Dutch side received its Country status.
Asked at the press conference about the much-talked-about border issue affecting Captain Oliver's Marina and Restaurant, she said: "That is precisely an example of what a mixed commission can address, to define the border. There are the rights of the State and the rights of persons to take into account. But we also have common ground, which is Europe. I believe this is something to be solved by agreement at the level of Holland and France, not locally."
Expanding further on the border issue, Senator Fleming commented: "The border issue at Oyster Pond has always been there, it didn't just surface. Obviously the intervention by the French was not legal and that's why it's been decided they [the French] hold off. After the Dutch side gets its new status, either we revise and update the original Treaty of Concordia or we sit down and negotiate a new cooperation treaty with St. Maarten. But right now a lot of things depend on the outcome of the Dutch side's future.
"The minister is fully aware of the Dutch side's institutional modification," he added. "We know the police cooperation treaty is blocked in Curaçao, but tomorrow we will have a government and a justice minister in Philipsburg. The joint prison idea and the police cooperation treaty will become reality when a new government is in place. The Franco-Dutch Treaty, the Lt. Governor informed us, has one more meeting to go, and that will go into effect providing joint immigration control at the airport."
The last stop on the minister's agenda was Sandy Ground, where she visited the Cultural Centre and met with the board of association Sandy Ground on the Move and young people working in an integration project. Sandy Ground is one area selected for financial aid from the Collectivité and Guadeloupe, to remunerate and help the youth integrate into the workforce. Some 50 young persons have jobs with the association.
"I'm very pleased the Minister chose to visit Sandy Ground as we are one district that has a large concentration of young people," said Community Council President Julien Richardson. "We wanted to bring to her attention that the young people don't get the total money due to them because of the social charges that have to be paid. We want the social charges reduced or dropped. If not, this will only hinder us in employing more young people and will not help reduce the delinquency problem."
President Gumbs said a wide range of topics had been discussed during the day. He described the minister's visit as "positive."
