But while we continue to wait on those electric buses, the city council has not been waiting to prepare for the hurricane season. And if all goes well, this will be the year that the pumping station at Yarborough is fully functional, which will go a long way in mitigating flooding in the city. Today, he told us more about how they've been preparing.
Bernard Wagner, Mayor of Belize City
"We've been doing preparation, like I said previously, hurricane season is not just a one year thing now, it's throughout the year and it's constantly preparing, when the hurricane season is finished we immediately start to see what went wrong, how can we improve in what area, and the main thing here is about the city being able to respond quickly and having the maintenance plan in terms of our drains, really reshaping those drains, ensuring that they are connected, because you could have a drain but it doesn't connect to anywhere so you have to ensure that it is connected and it is flowing to a canal and then the canal to a river and the river back out to the sea so we are very optimistic of what we have put in so far, we still remain behind in terms of the pumping station, that is slated to be completed on July the 14th I believe, that was the last correspondent I had with those people that are putting together that pumping station but if that is ready for July the 14th and we cross our fingers that nothing happens before then, we will prepare the canals, dredge all the attaching canals, we can't do it before the pumping station is completed but again we call on the residents to really be mindful of what they are throwing in the canals, we are still facing a huge challenge where we're seeing the mattresses, the old stove, the old refrigerator being thrown and it will create big issues in respect to that pumping station because God forbid that one of those reach into that area, it could really damage the equipment there so we have to start at the family and really inform the public about cleanliness, we can't have sustainable city if it's not clean."
