Philipsburg: --- Several civil servants working for the island government of St. Maarten are angry at a newspaper article that appeared in the Daily Herald on Tuesday accusing them of not amending the room tax ordinance.The civil servants who spoke to SMN News on the condition of anonymity said that they are not scapegoats and politicians should not use them for their own political mileage or to their benefit. The civil servants contested the contents of the article by providing SMN News with the decision taken by the Democratic Party executive council on January 22 2009 to deny Westin and Sonesta Maho of the room tax waiver they promised them some four years ago. They also provided SMN News with copies of the letters sent to the resort on June 30th 2009 saying that Marlin should dance to the music and not blame them since they did not run for office. "On several occasions the elected would ask civil servants to do the impossible even though they know we can go to prison for not following the law."
According to the civil servants, the former finance and tourism commissioner Roy Marlin should let the people know that he promised Westin to amend the room tax ordinance in exchange for the renting of his house. "While the former commissioner was collecting his house rent Westin was waiting in limbo".
They said Marlin knew that he was not in a position to amend the ordinance since what he wanted was against the law. The civil servants said legal affairs provided the Democratic Party executive council with an advice on this matter since 2005.
They said Marlin had issued the letter of comfort to Westin Dawn Beach in 2005 while he did the same to Maho Sonesta in 2003 and only on January 22 2009 the executive council basically took a decision to deny both these resorts their request.
In the article, Marlin said while his executive council had the amendments of the ordinance as high priority that was not the case with the departments. While Marlin said legal affairs and Resources, management had to work on the ordinance to enable the amendments, which delayed the process. The civil servants said the executive council had gotten the advice in the early months of 2005 since he Marlin had promised Westin to make the amendments by mid 2005.
Leader of government William Marlin had made this disclosure last week telling members of the media that they were busy cleaning up another mess made by the former executive council. Marlin said his government would not be taking any blame for the Westin affair, but he was busy negotiating with the island receivers and Westin management to find an amicable solution.
Below is the decision taken by the executive council on January 22 2009 as well as the letters sent to both resorts.
Last Tuesday SMN News reported that the island receivers for unpaid room tax from 2004 to 2009 placed a lien on Westin Resort. This sparked some heavy discussions last week including court hearings after the Island Receivers office had decided to auction the movable properties at the Resort. An agreement was reached late Thursday night between parties to hold off on the auction until another court hearing. It is understood that Westin has decided to place the monies owed to the island government in an escrow account until the hearing.
Westin was supposed to invest in the training of locals and other infrastructure that would have boosted the tourism industry. The former executive council had promised to grant the waiver for at least five years whenever they changed the legislation.
