"I wish to use this opportunity to register my call for a coming together of all agencies to see to the restoration of downtown Montego Bay focusing on the city's centre, which includes the business districts and inner-city communities," said Crump during a Gleaner Editors' Forum in Montego Bay last Thursday.

"In fact, I am proposing that we need to revisit the Greater Montego Bay Redevelopment Plan developed in the 1990s and which has since been shelved," Crump added.

But that has not found favour with president of the Jamaica Hotel and Tourist Association, Wayne Cummings.

"It is easier we build a new town than to redevelop Montego Bay. Now, we're going to have to decide what we want our town to look like and get behind a competent planner and then decide to plug ourselves in," countered Cummings.

"I promise you, I respect all your views but I've heard it all. That is why Fairview is the new town - the last time I went into Montego Bay was three and a half months ago because I don't need to go there."

However, St James Parish Development Committee Chairman Mark Kerr-Jarrett maintained that greater consensus was needed from residents for buy-in of projects.

"What is important for us as Montegonians is that we all participate in the planning process so that the input into it takes places ... where the fora are available, we must participate because if we don't, we can't complain," Kerr-Jarrett argued.

But community activist O. Dave Allen said that privilege to determine what is happening in Montego Bay has been taken away from the populace.

technical planning debate

"There is planning taking place from Kingston. We have grown accustomed to a participatory process where all publics of Montego Bay were involved in us shaping our own plan. No wonder you are not getting the buy-in that you demand because that plan is a stranger to us."

But Kerr-Jarrett countered as the debate continued over the Greater Montego Bay Redevelopment Company (GMRC) plan that was conceptualised in 1996 to design a development order to guide the expansion of the city.

"It does not matter, should we say, who does the technical side of the plan because the UDC (Urban Development Corporation) has the technical capacity to actually do the development plan. We tried to get the GMRC up and running and get the funding using the parish council as the planning authority. I think it was the NHT (National Housing Trust) had committed $8 million to the process, and we got other commitments and the budget for the entire plan was something like $52 million," the businessman explained.

"There were stipulations, however, that neither the NHT nor the UDC would make their contributions available until the remainder of the budget was found. We tried going back to the Montego Bay business community for the funding of it and we got significant amounts, but I think the frustration in the floundering of the GMRC had the business community a little sceptical. It really came down to the issue of funding, it was not there."

But Crump is adamant that under his administration, the chamber will be focusing on engaging and supporting small and medium enterprises, as 80 per cent of his membership falls into that category.