Parris: Don’t forget the unemployed this season

RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

Se­nior Mul­ti­me­dia Re­porter

rad­hi­[email protected]

San Fer­nan­do May­or Robert Par­ris called on cit­i­zens not to for­get un­em­ployed res­i­dents as the city marked the start of the Christ­mas sea­son with the light­ing of a 46-foot tree fit­ted with 30,000 LED lights on Wednes­day night.

Speak­ing just be­fore ac­ti­vat­ing the switch, Par­ris said the cel­e­bra­tion should in­clude sup­port for those with­out in­come, and he an­nounced that City Hall will serve meals to un­em­ployed per­sons on Christ­mas Day.

Par­ris told the crowd that he in­tends to spend Christ­mas Day at City Hall, rather than at home with his fam­i­ly, where he and vol­un­teers will pre­pare and dis­trib­ute food. He in­vit­ed mem­bers of the pub­lic to as­sist, say­ing the sea­son re­quires at­ten­tion to peo­ple in need and to the hol­i­day's pur­pose.

Res­i­dents gath­ered along the Rien­zi Kir­ton High­way and along Cipero Road where the tree was in­stalled through the ef­forts of busi­ness­man Si­mon Alexan­der, his wife Sher­ry and staff from Al­lied Home Cen­tre and Al­lied Fam­i­ly Care and Phar­ma­cy. Alexan­der said he had dis­cussed light­ing the area for sev­er­al years and de­cid­ed not to de­lay any fur­ther. He said the struc­ture was as­sem­bled over re­cent weeks, and he thanked T&TEC crews led by Ra­jiv Paras­ram, who worked on the in­stal­la­tion and elec­tri­cal con­nec­tions.

Alexan­der said as a child of the coun­try­side, he re­mem­bered walk­ing through the vil­lage dur­ing Christ­mas to view light dis­plays and meet neigh­bours. He said lights en­cour­age peo­ple to gath­er, talk, share food and drinks and in­ter­act in ways that build com­mu­ni­ty ties. He said the goal of the project was to bring res­i­dents to­geth­er and give back to San Fer­nan­do, which he said has sup­port­ed his busi­ness ac­tiv­i­ties.

Busi­ness­woman Paula Ather­ly al­so ad­dressed the gath­er­ing and thanked Alexan­der and his fam­i­ly for the in­stal­la­tion. She said the tree would draw fam­i­lies to the site and give res­i­dents a rea­son to vis­it the area dur­ing the sea­son.

Mem­bers of the Alexan­der fam­i­ly, in­clud­ing Dr Adri­an Alexan­der, al­so spoke briefly, thank­ing San Fer­nan­do res­i­dents for their sup­port of their busi­ness­es and ac­knowl­edg­ing the role of staff and part­ners who as­sist­ed in the con­struc­tion. The light­ing event drew res­i­dents from around the city who re­mained on site to eat, drink and view the dis­play af­ter the switch-on.