Council pulls plug on mayor’s Porsche

CHIEF EXECUTIVE Officer (CEO) of the St Ann Municipal Corporation, Rovel Morris, has said that the plug-in facility that was installed to charge the personal hybrid Porsche of the mayor, Michael Belnavis, has been removed.

For weeks, tongues have been wagging about the facility and associated costs to taxpayers.

Yesterday, Morris told members of Parliament’s Public Administration and Appropriations Committee that the charging port has been taken down and “all costs that were associated with the installation will be recovered”.

The CEO confirmed that it cost the municipality more than $80,000 to install the facility. He denied claims that the electricity costs of the St Ann Municipal Corporation had ballooned as a result of the charging port.

Committee member Fitz Jackson had pressed Morris to disclose the basis for installing the vehiclecharging facility. Morris wanted to know if Jackson was asking a “trick question”.

“My questions are not tricky,” Jackson responded. They are very straightforward, he added.

However, Morris indicated that in meetings with the chief internal auditor, no regulations were found that prohibited the municipality from proceeding with the facility.

“... It was just based on ethics, so we did not find a regulation to say that it could not be done, but in order to address it, we corrected it,”he said.

He disclosed that a request has been made for a meter to be attached, with the mayor covering the associated costs.