The Hindu 07.01.2011
New plan for Shimoga’s upkeep ready
The City Municipal Council (CMC) at its meeting here on Thursday decided
to entrust the cleaning exercise in the select 25 wards to private
agencies as a package to ensure proper cleanliness and hygiene in the
city. The meeting decided to seek suggestions of the Standing Committee
regarding the wards where the package should be implemented before the
proposal was sent to the Government for its approval.
Deputy Commissioner V. Ponnuraj, who attended the
meeting as a special invitee, said there was a need to lay more emphasis
on cleanliness. He said the package programme was inevitable for proper
maintenance of cleanliness in the city. Environmental engineer at the
CMC, Manukumar, said cleanliness drive in the 25 wards would be
outsourced to private agencies for seven years under the proposed
package which covered the responsibility of maintaining cleanliness of
roads, conservancies, and removal of debris from the houses and
commercial buildings.
He said there were 58,363 residential houses and 12,000
commercial buildings apart from 35,000 houses in the slums which
produced nearly one ton garbage everyday. He said it was proposed to
take up the cleanliness work through 190 civic workers in the remaining
10 wards collecting the garbage through 73 auto tippers.
However, councillors S.K. Mariappa, M. Shankar and
Vishwanath took objection to the yardstick being applied in the
selection of wards for the implementation of the special package. Deputy
Commissioner suggested that the decision on it could be taken after
placing the matter before the Standing Committee.
Referring to the problems arising in the low-lying areas
when affected by flash floods, he suggested preparing an action plan to
improve the drainage system so that the Government could be approached
for financial assistance for its implementation.
He said cleaning of the conservancies would be taken up for their being used as parking space for vehicles.
He said the conservancy next to the Mallikarjun cinema
would be taken up on an experimental basis for developing it as the
parking space. Mr. Ponnuraj asked the municipal authorities to ensure
that the parking and setback rules were not violated in the construction
of the new buildings.
