Unbiased look at the Sint Maarten Elections
As the island celebrated St. Martin/St. Maarten Day, many were still discussing the rainstorm early Saturday morning and its considerable impact. Although the downpour was so heavy one hardly could expect runoff systems to handle easily the sheer volume of water coming down the hills, environmentalist/politician Rueben Thompson insists elected and appointed officials must be held accountable (see related article).
He referred to his repeated warnings about building in natural gutters and maintaining man-made ones. Especially regarding the various ponds as catchment basins, the number three candidate on the United St. Maarten (US) Party list in the recent parliamentary election has a point.
Apart from the often indiscriminate "filling-in" practices to create land along these bodies of water over the years, when the – still unfinished – construction of the ring road was announced, concerns were expressed about its effect on Great Salt Pond's retention capacity. A report indicating that the critical minimum would not be reached was used to justify the project, which supposedly even created an extra "buffer" to protect Philipsburg.
If the latter is true, that only goes for a certain section, while other parts now seem more prone to flooding than ever. That only one pump reportedly was available to get rid of the excess water via Rolandus Canal probably didn't help, nor did the fact that the Fresh Pond outlet into Great Bay wasn't opened until areas in the vicinity already had flooded.
Still, looking back at Hurricane Lenny in November 1999 when much of "Sunshine City" was under water for several days, one has to wonder whether the situation actually has improved in more than a decade since then. If that's not the case it is indeed a crying shame and authorities need to get to the bottom of this matter quickly to provide the public with an – if at all possible satisfactory – explanation.
