Tweet
What are your thoughts on this ..??
I think it is a bad idea ..
But that is just because i'm used to it being where it is ..
What do you think about the relocation and sale ??
link ...
<span style="color: #3333FF"><span style="font-size: 17pt">JDF HQ sale before Cabinet</span></span>
<span style="font-weight: bold"><span style="font-size: 11pt">Housing development proposed for Up Park Camp</span></span>
BY H G HELPS Editor-at-Large Investigative Coverage Unit [email protected]
Sunday, July 12, 2009
A proposal to sell Up Park Camp, the 90-hectare St Andrew property that houses the headquarters of the Jamaica Defence Force (JDF), and utilise the land for a major housing development is now before the Cabinet and is expected to be examined very soon, the Sunday Observer has learnt.
According to a senior Government official who requested anonymity, the proposal is for the seven major units of the JDF's regular force - with over 2,500 officers and soldiers - as well as its reserve force to be relocated to properties in Vernamfield, Clarendon and Caymanas Estates, St Catherine.
<span style="font-style: italic">The main entrance to Up Park Camp, the Jamaica Defence Force headquarters in St Andrew.
</span>
Vernamfield was once used as an airstrip, while the Government owns over 5,000 acres of land in Caymanas Estates.
A timeline for the relocation has not been determined and the overall cost of the exercise was not immediately known.
"Cabinet is to look at the matter of relocation soon and a decision is to be made," the senior government official told this newspaper last week.
"The plan is to divest the property, as it is prime real estate. The Government needs the money and such a sale would go a far way in achieving certain budgetary goals. It would also adequately address the chronic housing shortage in the Kingston region," the official said.
Initial information showed that the National Housing Trust had a keen interest in the property at Up Park Camp.
<span style="font-style: italic">KNIGHT. it's not a good idea. When certain institutions have been established, you don't tamper with locations, especially when the location does not hamper development</span>
Yesterday, Daryl Vaz, the minister with responsibility for information, told the Sunday Observer that there was an ongoing discussion to relocate the air wing of the JDF to Vernamfield in Clarendon, to "free up that space".
However, Vaz said that he was not aware of a pending discussion on the relocation of the entire army.
"The discussion in relation to the Vernamfield development and establishing part of the army there and freeing up that space in Kingston has been going on," Vaz said.
Asked if the land now used by the JDF's air wing would be used for housing development if there is a relocation, Vaz responded: "Certainly."
<span style="font-style: italic">VAZ. the discussion in relation to the Vernamfield development and establishing part of the army there and freeing up that space in Kingston has been going on</span>
In respect of the use of Caymanas Estates as an alternative, Vaz said that he had not heard of that.
"I didn't hear anything about Caymanas Estates to be used to relocate the rest of the army," he said. "What I know is that a portion of Caymanas Estates is being eyed in respect of the relocation of the Tinson Pen Aerodrome."
The JDF was formed days before Jamaica gained Independence from Britain on August 6, 1962. It replaced the Jamaica Regiment, which itself took over from the West India Regiment, a force comprising various Caribbean nationals.
Sections of the original portion of land owned by the JDF have since been allocated to the Bustamante Hospital for Children, Independence Park Ltd, and the Mobile Reserve of the Jamaica Constabulary Force.
Yesterday, the JDF said that it was not aware that a relocation plan was still being considered.
"That move as far as I know has been put on the back-burner right now, but I could find out and let you know more," said the JDF's information spokesman Major Richard Blackwood when asked by the Sunday Observer for a comment.
The high cost of relocating the JDF and setting up sound physical structures at Vernamfield and Caymanas would also figure prominently in the plan to relocate, one Government official said.
One man who is against the relocation of the JDF is former minister of national security and justice, KD Knight.
"No. It's not a good idea," Knight said in an interview yesterday.
"The issue of selling the Up Park Camp property did not arise when I was minister between 1989 and October 2001. There were no such plans on the cards.
"When certain institutions have been established, you don't tamper with locations, especially when the location does not hamper development.
"Kingston needs some open spaces. You can't put concrete everywhere. I already feel distressed in the way they have used the land at Race Course (National Heroes Circle) and I have told them so," Knight said.
Calls have been made for a merger of the constabulary and the army, but officials, including Police Commissioner Rear Admiral Hardley Lewin, a former head of the JDF, have warned against it.
Plans have been advanced too, for land on which the police commissioner's office is housed along Old Hope Road to be sold and used for a middle-income housing development.
That move is dependent upon a suitable alternative location being found for the commissioner's office.
Among the structures that have been identified is the downtown high-rise building which formerly housed the defunct Jamaica International Telecommunications (Jamintel), once a subsidiary of telecommunications giants Cable & Wireless, whose Jamaica operations are now known as LIME.
Other locations that were looked at by the police hierarchy some years ago were the properties housing the JCF's Protective Services Division on Ruthven Road and the Elletson Road police complex.
<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: evanovitch</div><div class="ubbcode-body">u haffi admire Jamaican greed, classism n juss plain greed... n did I mention greed...
Comment