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“What’s really going on with this WASA water tank?” Bobby inquired, in the middle of our walk last Wednesday morning.
In the area to the west of the tank, there was heavy machinery, a tractor and a front-end loader. I know that put Bobby’s mind at ease. He is a man who consumes myriad mysteries on television. And when we were lower down on the barbergreen, we had seen lights unwontedly moving around.
“It’s, what, more than a year now since they put the cover on?” he continued. “Has anybody at all got a drop of water from this project? Does anybody know what the plan is? Do you?”
I didn’t, had no idea. But in jest I promised to try to get a number for Public Utilities Minister Marvin Gonzales or WASA Comms man Daniel Plenty.
I did know, though, where Bobby was coming from. For quite some time now, he has been going on about WASA’s culture of waste, casual and systemic. When you grow up, like we both did, in a large family with less-than-modest means, waste is anathema to you. And for him, the waterless Lillian Heights Service Reservoir was a classic example of waste.
But there’s more. During Covid or just after it, he had been moved to shoot a video of a non-negligible leak in a Trincity street. The residents had made repeated reports to WASA but it had gone unrepaired for over a month. The day after Bobby threatened to send the video to the three television stations, a crew turned up on the site.
Two weeks ago, we were on our way back from the Eddie Hart Savannah when we had an encounter with a neighbour on his street. The affable septuagenarian was at it again. His four dogs presumably don’t miss a day. Or a night. Having no choice but to clean up after them, nor does he.
Where he does have a choice is in how he does so. And like thousands of I-really-doh-care-bout-de-res-ah-allyuh Trinbagonians, he makes the wrong choice. Consistently.
For the clean-up, he uses not a shovel or a broom but a hose. Nothing but. Gallons of water daily go down the drain. Literally.
“You know using a broom would be much quicker?” Bobby asked him cheerily.
“And,” I chimed in, “it would save water.”
“Scarce water!” Bobby made the point in the most economical way.
“A lotta people does tell me dat,” he said with a shrug, casting a nervous glance up and down the street. “I suppose I would have to tink seriously about it.”
And, as if he had heard not a word either of us had said, he went right on washing the pavement.
As we moved on, I reminded Bobby that my next-door neighbour, female, is a hose-sweeper too. Hers is a twice-a-day routine, morning and evening, her flower garden also passing in the rush.
With the end of sweltering, rainless March in sight, that status remains quo. Who cares about the steadily dropping level in the nation’s reservoirs? Or the WASA ban?
The ban, in theory in place until the end of the dry season in June, also covers sprinklers, water fountains and power washers. But who checks? Where are WASA’s monitoring mechanisms?
And even if somebody did break the ban and was caught and convicted, what is the penalty? It would set him/her back, the current regulations say, the princely sum of $75.00, doubtless a major deterrent!
Moreover, WASA major thrust at fostering conservation never comes in the rainy season. When there is water, water everywhere, that’s the time to teach people to save the precious commodity. When it’s in scarce supply, necessity forces you to save, which does not exactly change unwanted behaviours.
Culture, as Lloyd Best regularly asserted, is quicksand. But WASA has apparently never got that memo. Nor has the Minister. Certainly, neither seems to have an answer to the concomitant question: how does the culture escape from itself?
The Minister, however, does not appear to be unduly perturbed. He seems comfortable with the behaviours on display among the citizenry but, it seems, less so with the corporate culture.
Me: I heard him say on TV the other night that “people are doing what they’re supposed to do”. Well, your neighbour and my neighbour are not people. Clearly!
Bobby: Either that or what they’re supposed to do is waste water. Whether it’s January or July. Makes no difference.
Me: And what about in WASA? People there also doing what they supposed to do?
Not so long ago, I hear the Minister publicly threaten to fire the district manager responsible for some place called Kernahan Road. He said people there were supposed to be getting water in their taps but they weren’t. I wonder if the investigation is already over and it shows that that manager was also doing what he’s supposed to do?
Bobby: Hahaha! And I wonder if all the people in WASA are doing what they’re supposed to do too. Not for the first time, government talking about a restructuring plan. The Minister planning, according to the media, to get rid of about 50% of the company’s managers.
Me: Not in WASA, breds! Brother Marvin could talk big on TV but I sure he know whey barley grow. I mixing my metaphors but he better bat in he crease.
Bobby: Meaning?
Me: It’s not easy to fire a WASA manager, breds! Especially one who’s been around for some time. I hear plenty, plenty WASA managers just like community leaders; if yuh touch them, yuh could be in trouble. In danger!
So Brother Marvin might find himself fighting against the brotherhood ah de boat!
(via Ministry of Public Utilities)
Bobby: Hahaha! His chances might be better as Marvellous Marvin. He defended his championship title 12 times—with 11 knockouts, I think!
Me: Don’t fool yuh fat, breds! Marvellous Marvin was a middleweight. Not even Sugar Ray, the best middleweight, could handle this challenge. Nobody have a serious chance of winning in WASA unless he is a genuine heavyweight.
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