The Tribune

EDITOR, The Tribune.

Communication etiquette is certainly in the toilet these days, particularly if one is trying to communicate with people in government, who are theoretically “Servants of the people”. We have gone from the never answered telephones, to the voicemail expeditions, to email which sometimes will elicit a response and can be programmed to confirm receipt or even opened. No proof of reading, of course, and certainly none of comprehension.

On September 15, I emailed my Member of Parliament (Brent Symonette) and the chairman of the Town Planning Committee (my nephew Adrian White) in what I hoped might be a simple appeal to bring a tiny bit of hope to merchants on Bay Street. My appeal was to see if anything might be done to allow shoppers to find parking spaces Downtown. As I have had some involvement with Minister Desmond Bannister in a road matter, I copied him on my appeal.

In less than 15 minutes, I received a response from Minister Bannister, saying my request was more a matter for Minister Dion Foulkes who now had responsibility for Ministry of Transport in Cabinet and he very kindly copied him in on the reply to me.

Delightful, I thought, and replied thanking Minister Bannister. I also took the opportunity to lay out my rationale and identify possibilities, as I now had Minister Foulkes included in the conversation, or so I thought.

As many retail merchants in Nassau will be struggling, and with little hope of cruise ship business, I felt if a more equitable use of Downtown parking could be had, then maybe the chance of survival might be enhanced.

On September 28, your Tribune columnist Tanya Smith-Cartwright published a very interesting article in Insight “Why are we waiting” which was suggesting now might be the time to begin revitalising Bay Street, and this of course went hand in hand with my initiative to deal with parking. I noted time had not permitted Minister Foulkes to respond to me yet, but I expressed the hope he might soon. As Ed Fields is heavily involved in trying to revitalise Downtownm I copied him on the email chain as well as your columnist.

Almost a full month later on October 26, you published an excellent Editorial entitled “Time to breathe life into Downtown”. Again I wrote to Minister Foulkes, this time euphemistically acknowledging time had obviously not permitted him to respond to either of my previous missives but drawing his attention to your editorial of that day. As Minister Turnquest would also be keen to see some economic improvement and Minister D’Aguilar also I am sure, I copied them also on my email to Minister Foulkes.

As we are now approaching the two month mark, since my first reaching out directly to Minister Foulkes, and having had no response as yet, I can only assume that he is either not reading my emails, or has not understood what is being asked of him, in his capacity as Minister of Transport. Or he is just being blatantly rude and ignoring me. Yes, me, who through my taxes pays him. Which he still receives even though my shop and most others remains closed.

BRUCE G RAINE

President, International Private Banking Systems,

Nassau,

November 7, 2020