As the process of preparing the country’s Local Authorities (LAs) to assume the leading role the new local governance paradigm continues, the Ministry of Local Government & Community Development will be implementing a series of workshops across the island.

The series, entitled Consolidating the new Local Governance paradigm: Challenges, Opportunities and Imperatives for the Next 3 Years, is being undertaken in partnership with the Commonwealth Fund for Technical Cooperation (CFTC) and is being viewed as an orientation exercise for new members of Council.  As such the workshops will:

·        Provide orientation, training and general sensitization for local officials and their civil society counterparts regarding the new subject areas and responsibilities that are now being conferred on local government, as part of Local Government Reform.

·         Ensure that Local Authorities and their civil society counterparts have a sound appreciation of the new concepts that will guide the role and functions of LAs and the mandates given to them.

·         Prepare LAs to effectively discharge these functions as well as to identify and undertake immediate and/or medium term enhancement to the institutional capacity of LAs and their partners, in respect of these new mandates.

The series which comprises four (4) 2day workshops, came about as a result of the Ministry being approached by the Planning Institute of Jamaica (PIOJ) to develop and submit a project proposal that would emphasize and focus on initiatives pertaining to Capacity Building and Institutional Strengthening in the Local Authorities with particular regard to the emerging governance framework and the enhanced role and function of main stakeholders at the local level.

The Ministry submitted a proposal that included a short term and a medium term model and the CFTC through the PIOJ, agreed to support the short term model. In late March 2012, a CFTC Mission Team met with the Permanent Secretary and Senior Officials of the Ministry of Local Government as well as Senior Officers from the PIOJ to discuss, support and ratify the project. The Mission Team was also able to meet with some key stakeholders in the process including Mayors, Secretary/Managers, ALGA and the PDCs.

The workshops are scheduled as follows:

·         June 20 -21, 2012: Workshop #2 (Portland, St. Mary & St. Ann)

·         June 26–27, 2012: Workshop# 3 (Trelawny, St. James, Hanover & Westmoreland)

·         July 3-4, 2012: Workshop # 4 (St. Elizabeth, Manchester & Clarendon)