Hurricane Dean was forecasted to hit Belize City with tropical storm force winds. It didn’t but fearing the worse, nearly two thousand people rode out hurricane dean at shelters in the city and thousands more left the city. Those 2,000 residents stayed in 12 shelters managed by the City Council. Mayor Zenaida Moya today told us that the lesson Hurricane Dean taught them is that they need more shelters.
Zenaida Moya, Mayor
“We did pretty well. Of course there will always be room for improvement but on a whole I think the exercise proved to us certain things that we are already knew. One is that there is need for more hurricane shelters. Last minute, after all the shelters were filled to capacity, NEMO had to designate new shelters. We were fortunate enough to get the UB Technical College, one of their buildings. We also were fortunate to get UWI and so we must again state the need for more shelters.
We know that certain shelters, they are not adequate. Pallotti High School being one of them and they were filled to capacity so that two of the bathrooms that were way downstairs, we need to do something about that and bring bathroom facilities more to their convenience.
But I am very, again I feel very blest and I believe that Belize City residents feel very blest that God did not allow anything to happen to us. At this same time I know our Corozal and our San Pedro sisters, they also feel blest that there was no lost of life. So again on a whole, Belize is blest and we feel pretty good that in the event that something happens. We will have the experience.”