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MARIGOT--The majority party adopted the new Urban Code at the year’s last Territorial Council meeting on Thursday despite the Opposition voicing several concerns before abstaining on the vote. The Code will now come into effect on March 1, 2015.
The vote followed the public meeting and presentation on December 4 with the specialist and editor of the Code, Philippe Baffert. On December 5 technicians correlated the Urban Code project with the Plan Local Urbanisme (PLU) and on December 9 the urbanism commission harmonised further aspects of the Code.
Since April 2012 St. Martin no longer falls under the national building codes and needed to either write its own code or take the national code and simplify it. The decision was taken to simplify it.
However, the Opposition party had reservations about the Code creating confusion with the PLU indicating that it was too soon for the Collectivité to have its own Code. Moreover, there were doubts the urbanism service would be prepared for the logistical changes in the PLU and Code. However, this was countered by the majority stating that urbanism employees would be trained in the new procedures.
Adoption of the Code paves the way for the PLU to be finalised, however, it will not come into effect until September 2015, after it has been presented to the public and subsequently approved by the Council.
The Council then voted unanimously to create a Territorial Commission on Urbanism. This commission will be presided over by Aline Hanson with Guillaume Arnell as substitute. The members are René Jean Duret (substitute Jeanne Rogers-Vanterpool), Rosette Gumbs-Lake (substitute Louis Fleming) and Dominique Riboud (substitute Maud Ascent-Gibs).
The commission will be associated with representatives of the Chamber of Commerce, Préfecture, Economic Council, and the district councils where projects concern them.
In another agenda point the Council adopted the St. Martin Tourism Office budget which remains unchanged at 3 million euros. The Opposition abstained as did Independent Councillor Jules Charville.
Tourism Office Interim Director Kate Richardson gave a presentation of the activities in 2014 and outlined the main projects for 2015. The objective is to focus on the Canadian and South American markets that are performing well. With the budget divided equally between promotional and operating funds she noted that 22 per cent of the promotion budget will be devoted to a new communication plan.
“We will be launching a new campaign most likely in April 2015 and an advertising campaign in France, Canada, Brazil and the USA,†she said. “Even though we are maintaining the work done with tour operators and travel agents we will be focusing more on the consumer and concentrating on the South American market that is bringing big business to the island.â€
