SOURCE: BY KEVIN S. TYDERSON
Report from Margibi County says that citizens of the county are warming up for the ensuing 2018 County Sitting which is slated for Friday, July 9, 2018.
The report says that delegates are expected to be drawn from the various districts of the county and that only those invited from the various districts will be allowed to enter and take seats at the conference Hall.
Our correspondent said some citizens since July this year have been complaining that the county authorities were slow in planning the county sitting.
He said some believed that this year’s County Sitting will be centered on the alleged slow pace of the implementation of projects that were earmarked since the 2011 and 2013 Fiscal Budget.
Nevertheless there has been controversy among citizens of the county and the county authorities on the slow pace of implementation of $2.7 million approved under the County and Social Development Fund in 2011 and 2013 to rehabilitate streets in Kakata, expand a school and build two town halls and a multi-purpose center at the Booker Washington Institute (BWI).
The controversy was reportedly orchestrated by a report from the General Auditing Commission (GAC) that the county approved 12 projects during fiscal years 2011 and 2013, but only 10 were targeted.
According to the report in September 2013, only four of the 10 projects were completed, two were abandoned and four are unfinished. The audit showed that the county spent $1,230,775.88 of the $2.7 million to implement the ten projects.
Superintendent Jerry Varnie, who took over the leadership of the county on March 16, 2018, when contacted via mobile phone said the county’s debt burden is responsible for the slow pace of implementing projects approved and funded in fiscal years 2011 and 2013.
Varnie said after he carefully reviewed the documents left by his predecessor John Buway he noticed that the county did not disburse nearly 90 percent of the funds allocated for the projects to contractors.
He said BWI and several other projects were not mentioned in the reports and that the center was designed to include an auditorium, cafeteria, dormitory basketball court, and conference hall and office space.
Varnie said the documents turned over to him by his predecessor John Buway do not include any information on the BWI multi-purpose center.
He said he has been investigating how his predecessors managed project funds and will make appropriate report during the County Sitting on Friday.
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