Dear Editor,
It is good to hear the Association of Dutch Municipalities VNG delegation is here to identify areas the organization can assist St. Maarten with its structural recovery in the coming years.
As a former Member of Parliament and Minister, I advise government to let them assist in setting up a Strategic Climate Change plan. This is the right time for us to structurally set up such a plan to address climate change. Government should ask Holland to urgently provide significant financial, technical and other resources to assist St. Maarten in adapting to climate change and building systems for us to remain resilient in the increase in weather activity such as the threats posed by a tsunami and earthquakes.
Curacao has a strategic climate change plan which I have given government to use as a model to develop our plan for the country. We have to wake up to the fierce urgency of addressing climate change to protect our shorelines and people. I have too often heard some of our people saying that they went through Hurricane Luis.
We have to understand that future hurricanes would likely get stronger and more frequent. This year's hurricane season is already the most violent on record and it will become both stronger and more common as the world warms due to climate change.
Climate change is no longer some far off problem; it is happening here, it is happening now. We need to put structural plans and amend our building code to protect our shorelines, hills, Simpson Bay Lagoon, Kimsha, Beacon Hill, Philipsburg, Cul De Sac Basin, Cupecoy and other flood-prone low lying areas.
God forbid if we were to get a tsunami. Do we have anything in place to protect our shorelines and people? We need to educate our people of what to do in case of a tsunami, or a massive earthquake.
Our public sirens on the poles to alarm our people don't even work anymore. The Simpson Bay Lagoon is not a safe haven for boats during the hurricane season.
VNG can also assist us in putting a structural country-wide drainage system in place. Flooding is a major issue in St. Maarten and it needs to be addressed post haste before the next hurricane season. A lot of our major guts are blocked and need to be cleared for the water to flow freely to the Salt Pond and then to the Rolandus Canal.
We need to put preventive measures in place to protect our people from climate change to our shorelines, tsunami and flooding for the entire island. It's a collective accountability that we need to address this issue.
I advise that this should be a joint project of the French and Dutch side of the island, because we also see the devastation to low lying areas in Marigot, Lowlands, Sandy Ground, Grand Case and French Quarter.
Scientific analysis shows that the climate of the Caribbean region is already changing. For a region that is used to seeing hurricanes, I have never experienced the intensification of a tropical storm to a category five Hurricane within a day. We are seeing intense hot days, intense rainfall even causing massive flooding and rising sea levels that are consuming our beautiful beaches in which tourism and our locals depend on for their daily income.
Hurricane Irma’s ferocity destroyed even some of our strongest hurricane shelters and buildings.
Imagine the small island of Barbuda, for the first time has no human inhabitants.
I advise government to asked VNG to assist us in developing a strategic climate change plan for St. Maarten and to assist us with developing a structural master plan to deal with our country-wide drainage issue.
This is the time for us to come together and put preventive measures in place to address climate change. We also need to put a community educational plan in place to educate our people what to do in case of a tsunami, earthquake and major flooding of our island. And who better to ask for assistance than the Dutch who are known worldwide for building above and under water structures?
Maurice Lake
