DONATED TO CHARITIES BY COLINA

By LETRE SWEETING Tribune Staff Reporter lsweeting @ tribunemedia.net

THREE community outreach organisations each received $5,000 in donations from Colina Insurance Limited, as a part of the insurance agency’s annual International Women’s Day celebrations.

Colina presented a total of $15,000 in cheques to PACE Bahamas, Bahamas Crisis Centre, and Zonta Club of New Providence in an effort to encourage community outreach and gender equality.

Maxine Seymour, the insurance agency’s corporate communications director, said the donations were given in an effort to recognise the achievements of women across The Bahamas.

“We are thrilled to be able to partner with The Bahamas Crisis Centre and PACE again this year and to include Zonta Club of New Providence. We encourage everyone to embrace equity as we work together to end discrimination and promote gender parity,” she said.

Patrice Miller, principal of PACE Bahamas, said: “It is indeed a pleasure for us to participate and be a part of this occasion. PACE is an institution for teen mothers and it’s not just a school, but it’s also a programme where we have implemented programmes where students learn life skills.”

Ms Miller said more needs to be done to ensure fair treatment of both male and female students in school and as such, PACE is working to develop a programme for male students as well. “When our students get pregnant, the girls are placed in PACE and the boys are allowed to remain in school. Is that equality? It’s not,” she said. on doing long-term rentals, saying the “sporadic” flow of cash was not beneficial.

Cleopatra Christie, administrator for The Bahamas Crisis Centre, said the donation will do much to help the organisation with assisting the community.

“We thank you, Colina. Yes, we have accomplished much and we have done much, but still there is much more to be done,” Mrs Christie said.

Susan Demeritte, vice president of the Zonta Club of New Providence, also said thanks and said Zonta is “about uplifting the status of women”, through scholarships, 24-hour availability for provisions, a workforce readiness programme, as well as assistance for women in prison.

“Quite frankly, right now I’m not even in the vacation rental industry,” she told this newspaper yesterday.

“Even though I’m still registered through Airbnb, I’m actually doing longterm rentals in terms of, you know, not vacation rentals, because, you know, the sporadic flow of cash wasn’t really helping me a lot, you know.”

She continued: “But I think perhaps, you know, I don’t know, if the government is going to add incentives to persons who are in that industry then fine, but if it’s just a matter of just identifying you for additional tax purposes, I think you’re going to find a lot of people are not going to want to be registered or even provide.”

Online exchanges on the government’s plans show a largely negative reaction by vacation rental owners.

One person said: “Average Bahamians finally getting a piece of the tourism pie through ownership. Y’all know it wasn’t going to be long before this tax, tax, tax regime saw that. How else can they continue to increase the travel budget?”

Another person added: “Wiping out the middle class one tax at a time. Can’t catch a break for these humans.”