USAID moots City Managers Associations for Punjab cities

Chandigarh, Aug 30 (UNI) The United State Agency for International Development (USAID) has suggested that the Punjab government should form City Managers Associations for improving the quality of life in cities and towns and ensuring cleaniless.

This suggestion was mooted by Mr Amitabha Ray, USAID programme co-coordinator USAID after inaugurating workshop on aims, objectives and functions of City Managers Association in Punjab. The workshop was organised by the state Local Government Department today.

In his presentation, Mr Ray pointed out that such Associations had been formed in many other states. He said that the problems being faced by cities were enormous and complex and these Associations help in developing professional management skills of its members, enabling them to contribute to the improvement of quality of urban life.

Punjab Local government, Principal Secretary D S Bains in his address said that due to rapid urbaniation, cities had become engines of growth and to meet the demand for basic civil services, need of the hour was to generate more resources to provide basic civic amenities in a better way. He said that the Municipal Corporations have to raise more revenue from property tax and a proposal in this context had already been sent for approval to the government.

Mr Bains said that state government had decided to award Municipal Corporations that generate additional revenue and provide both high quality life and efficient infrastructure.

Mr Satish Malik, MD, Tetra Tech India Ltd, New Delhi in his presentation said that to generate money from waste, one has to collect such material from door-to-door and then segregate it. He said for collection of waste, special rickshaws had been designed with four bins in Delhi and a similar scheme could be introduced in Punjab.

UNI