Philipsburg:--- While there has been some severe budget cuts to accommodate the visit of the Royal Family to St. Maarten and St. Maarten's Day Celebration for 11/11/11 is practically overshadowed by the visit of the Royal Family. The Minister of Culture and Education granted a contract to Artemia Event Planners to the tune of $55,895.00 to decorate the lampposts and Festival Village for St. Maarten's Day Activities.
Artemia provided the Government of St. Maarten with an invoice to provide services for two sets of light pole banners with and without HSD, brackets, pennants, billboard banners, rotating billboards, entrance banners, uplighting, floral arrangements, stage banners, storage, and installations which will cost $55,895.00, not included in the bill is the freight charges which depends on government's choice on shipping.
On October 13 2011 based on an advice signed by the Education and Culture Department's Secretary General, the Government of St. Maarten approved the decorating for St. Maarten's Day to the tune of Naf: 100,611.00 which had to taken from budget post 6330-44201 to cover the services to be rendered by Artemia. The advice also included the approval of the release of the funds so that the materials could have been ordered from abroad.
SMN News learnt that while the Minister of Culture established a committee to organize St. Maarten Day festivities, no official advice on the week long activities has been presented to the Ministry let alone the Council of Ministers for approval.
At the Council of Ministers press briefing on Wednesday, SMN News asked the Minister if she received an advice and if there is an official budget for St. Maarten's Day celebration and Minister Arrindell said that a decision was taken to order the materials for the street decoration but she was not aware of the cost. Minister Arrindell said they also decided to split the advisory document into multiple documents. She said to date there is no final total for the host of activities planned but they are working on getting the decorations to St. Maarten.
The Advice and Invoice for Artemia Event Planners.
