Plans by Kingston Mayor Desmond McKenzie to redevelop the May Pen Cemetery got a major boost Friday with the announcement that the Port-of-Spain municipal council in the Trinidad and Tobago capital is to assist the upgrading project.

McKenzie’s Port-of-Spain counterpart, Murchison Brown, who is currently on an official five-day visit to Jamaica, did not say what form the assistance would take, but said that his council was in a position to provide significant assistance to the project, based on its wide expertise in the maintenance of cemeteries.

McKenzie also announced that work on the May Pen Cemetery restoration project was expected to start by the end of this week. The first phase will involve the bushing and cleaning up of the cemetery.

Mayor McKenzie’s $50 million project to restore the centuries-old cemetery was announced immediately after his appointment as mayor last June, following the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) victory in the 2003 Local Government elections.

The mayor said that $20 million had already been raised by a committee appointed by him to oversee the restoration process. Among the companies which have contributed to the project were the National Commercial Bank, Caribbean Cement Company and Life of Jamaica. Although they were still far off in terms of raising the total sum to finance the project, the committee wanted the process to start as early as possible, he said, adding that the KSAC was still soliciting donations.

Both mayors toured the cemetery yesterday, to give Mayor Brown a first-hand view of its current state, and the plans which have been proposed for its restoration.

Mayor Brown’s official visit to the island will be highlighted by a ceremony at the Bank of Jamaica auditorium tomorrow evening, when he will be presented with the Keys to the City of Kingston and an agreement signed twinning Kingston and Port-of-Spain.

Brown heralded the decision to twin the two cities as a positive move in light of the current integration of Caribbean Community (Caricom) economies. He said that while Caricom cities, in the past, had looked outside the region for cities to be twinned with, the two largest cities in the region were now setting the precedent for inter-regional co-operation between municipalities.

The visiting mayor is scheduled to join Mayor McKenzie in laying wreaths at the shrine of the late National Hero, Norman Manley, at National Heroes Park at 9:00 am today. July 4 is the anniversary of Manley’s birth.

At 10:00 am, he will be special guest at a thanksgiving service celebrating the first anniversary of the current KSAC Council which was elected in June 2003.

Yesterday, he toured the Golden Age Home in Vineyard Town; Devon House; Maxfield Park Children’s Home and the downtown market district.