Criminals, church groups are among those capturing community centres – McKenzie

Desmond McKenzie, the minister of local government and rural development, has said criminals, operators of early-childhood institutions and members of the religious community have ‘captured’ several community centres across the island and have locked out the citizens from accessing the services for which they were built.

While he did not identify any of the community centres in question, McKenzie challenged the Social Development Commission (SDC), through its community officers, to devise a plan to retake control of the island’s community centres, as those facilities have to become relevant in luring youth from a life of crime and violence.

“Community centres, some of them have been taken over to run basic schools. Some of them, criminals control them and keep their own private events and charge communities for the use of their spaces,” said McKenzie.

He was speaking at the Social Development Commission’s Long Service, Retirement, and Staff Recognition Awards Ceremony at the Montego Bay Convention Centre in St James on October 20.

“The role of the SDC has to go beyond [what it is now doing], because what we are confronted with as a country is no longer criminals who are in their late 20s, 30s and 40s – those criminals don’t exist anymore. What exit now are young men and women, 13, 14, 15 [who are detected by the police as the criminals],” McKenzie stated.

HIGH-SCHOOL BOYS CAUGHT

McKenzie spoke about an incident earlier this month in Portmore, St Catherine, where two 15-year-old high-school boys were among four persons caught by the police for allegedly robbing a couple along the Braeton main road of cash, mobile phones, and other items.

“This monster of crime that we are confronted with has been given tacit support by some parents, [and] by some communities, where they will defend the rights of the criminals,” the minister claimed, noting that many people don’t like when he says it.

“This country must recognise and understand that we can’t love good and bad at the same time, we must choose, and I challenge you as community officers [at the SDC] to engage them from early in the schools, in our community centres, by the various programmes that you have,” he added.

McKenzie said while he has no real issue with sharing community spaces, the church is guilty of capturing these spaces and using them for its own benefit.

“Community centres were built to engage communities … there are many community centres across Jamaica that have been abandoned, some have been taken over by churches, and they locked out the people in the community,” he noted.

The SDC, he said, has a role to play, because of those who we can save, we need to save them. “The SDC have to take a critical look at what is it you can do as an organisation to save a generation of young people who are going down the path of destruction. And as community officers, this Government will never allow $1 or $2 to prevent you from engaging and steering them away from that path of destruction,’’ he added.

Albert Ferguson