Team Herald
PANJIM: Congress leader and senior-most councillor, Surendra Furtado will be the new City Mayor. He won from ward no 10 for the sixth consecutive term and has served as Mayor for two years in the past. Speaking to Herald, St Cruz MLA Atanasio ‘Babush’ Monserrate said that he projected Furtado as the Mayor, while Asmita Kerkar will be the deputy Mayor.
Monserrate has 17 councilors in a 30 member City Corporation who will take the oath of secrecy shortly. Furtado, a close aide of Monserrate, during his last stint as Mayor, had proposed various measures for revenue generation with the prime focus on recovery of pending water and electricity dues from market occupants. This recovery would have fetched revenue of around Rs 15 crore to the CCP coffers.
The collection of long pending House tax (5cr), pending arrears like trade (2 cr), signboard (1.16cr) and sanitation (68 lakhs), were some of the revenue sources projected by the then Mayor. But lack of support from the BJP councilors forced him to slow down.
While giving a new look to the CCP conference hall to additional trucks for garbage collection through Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), Furtado was instrumental in getting the funds passed under the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (JNNURM) for various projects including the long pending beautification of St Inez creek and solid waste management facility at Bainguinim.
However, the Central Urban Development Ministry failed to earmark the amount in its 2014-15 and 2015-16 Union Budgets and hence the funds did not get released. Furtado, during his tenure as Mayor in 2013-2014 had proposed a pay parking facility to easy the traffic congestion. But that too faced a setback with BJP councillors raising strong objections.
