The Tribune

Two thirds of the Potter’s Cay vendors are not coming back to work today, citing serious financial challenges.

Wendi Constantine, president of the Bahamas Dock and Allied Venues Vendors Association (BDAVVA), told Tribune Business: “Some of the vendors won’t be coming back due to financial difficulties. A lot of them are disappointed that the government didn’t offer any form of mortgage relief, because you have to understand with a lot of banks a lot of persons did not qualify for the deferred option as some vendors had difficulties prior to COVID-19. There was the hurricane and then there was the reversal of the parking, so they have had their challenges for over a year or so. That is one of their main concerns.

“The vendors are just upset that the government didn’t make better preparations for self-employed persons as a lot of them are behind on their mortgages and utilities and a lot of them did not qualify for the deferred payment programme with the banks.

“With some banks you did not qualify if you were not current or you were having challenges prior.”

Ms Constantine went on to say some 30 percent of the vendors are coming back to Potter’s Cay today. “The food vendors, we have 42 of them and we are not talking about the fish and the conch persons, but the actual vendors themselves, the food vendors with the stalls. I’m looking at 30 percent of those that are able to

open on Monday.

“A lot of them applied for the rapid food programme and didn’t get that either. So they are really having their challenges.”

Ms Constantine, mentioned the efforts to sanitize and clean the Montague ramp, which she also represents. “We are hoping that we can undertake an exercise on Saturday where we can pressure clean and put some markings down. We all are complying and hopefully things will work out. We only can do take-out, curbside and delivery.”

“We had initiated a credit card programme prior to the lockdown and a lot of them are saying now that they won’t be able to go cashless anymore because they won’t be able to afford the fee to purchase the credit card machines anymore.

“We had done a programme with Fidelity Bank where persons had applied for the credit card machines and most of them had gotten approved and then we closed down.” She said Fidelity Bank had followed up with her on the initiative but she does not expect any vendors to move forward with this at the moment because the “money is too tight”, and this is something that has to go on the “back-burner”.

“It’s a challenge,” she added. “All we can do is hope for the best and just hope things are going to work out because you know with the parking is an issue and people used to be able to pull up, if they have to park all the way in the parking lot then that can pose another problem, but Commissioner of Police Paul Rolle has been more than sympathetic to what’s happening out there.”