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There's a major land development happening in the J&W area of Belmopan but burning on the lot raised alarm bells for residents in the area. That's because they're not sure if the developers have the necessary permits to even clear the area, much less burn it.
Courtney Menzies went west today to find out more. Here is that story.
Belmopan residents in the J&W area woke up in the early hours to a blazing fire in their neighborhood. It was a controlled burn to further clear a lot that will be developed in the near future.
But for the neighbors, apart from effects of the smoke, they were concerned about the legality of the clearing and the burning. However, when we spoke to the developers off camera, they stated that they had indeed gotten the required permit from DOE and had water trucks at the site.
And for one resident - and the former UDP candidate in that constituency - while he accepts that the smoke is bothersome, he explained that sometimes burning debris is necessary, especially when development is taking place.
Ralston Frazer, Resident
"There is expansion, land needs to cleared, lots need to be set up for people to build and development needs to continue. The question that finds itself in there is what do we do with the debris, what do we do with grass, what do we do with the trees, what do we do with the vegetation that we want to discard? Now that question is because, and I'm not saying this council, it has been happening for councils, the city seems not to be efficient enough or maybe it's because of economics, to remain on top of the debris collection according to the rate of development, which is quite rapid."
"I cut my own yard and my son rakes the stuff and we put it at a corner in the yard. We have about 4 to 5 months worth of grass that we have raked in the corner of my yard which indicates that the city has not been picking it up."
"Clearing at least has to happen so do we get permission to burn it or is there some kind of arrangement to cart it away. You're doing, I don't know, out front it's about 5 acres, you're doing 10 acres, 15 acres, upwards, how do you cart that away? To where do you cart it away? What do you do with the material then?"
Among the precautions that the developers took - which included burning while the nearby school was out for the Easter vacation - they set it at 2 this morning, and it was quelled by 4.
So - metaphorically - where there's smoke, there's not always fire.
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