By K. NANCOO-RUSSELL

Freeport News Reporter

krystal@nasguard.com

The fifth annual Common-wealth Local Government Conference (CLGC) was lauded as a big success by Minister of Lands and Local Government Byran Woodside yesterday.

Woodside revealed that a total of 550 delegates from 48 countries participated in the three-day conference.

"I am advised that this conference was the best yet. The fact that the conference was a success speaks to the hard work of the Grand Bahamian people," he said.

"We thought to provide a high level of hospitality... but I must say that Grand Bahamians did one better. They not only provided hospitality, they showed the heart of the Bahamian people."

The Minister expressed his gratitude to all of the organizers and all others who may have contributed to the success of the event.

"I wish to go on record in expressing most thanks to the people of Grand Bahama," he said.

"To the good folks at Bahamasair, to everyone who served in protocol, to the taxi drivers, who transported delegates from the airport to the hotel and to the hotel staff, the maids, and the busboys, the bartenders and all of the persons who did anything, large or small to have made this conference a wonderful success."

Woodside pointed out that there were some 115 Bahamian delegates present, and said the ideas they were exposed to during the conference should prove to be of great value as they return to their respective islands and put into practice what they learned.

"I'd like to believe that one of the things that they will take away from this conference is an understanding of best practices, having had the opportunity to learn about what's going on throughout the Common-wealth and hearing some of their counterparts from different countries share their experiences and how they have met some of the challenges of delivering service and improving services to the people they represent."

Commonwealth Local Govern-ment Forum chairperson Basil Morrison said the wealth of experience and knowledge that delegates brought with them collectively should mean that no participant should have left the conference without significant gain.

"Delegates will only get out of a conference what they put into it, if they want to partake in the workshops and get involved in the nuts and bolts of learning how other councils in other countries work then they will really have a great appreciation and go home with ideas," he said.

"It builds into the institutional knowledge of an elected member."

CLGF secretary-general Carl Wright agreed, and noted that much was accomplished during the course of the conference.

"We did have very very substantive discussions and I can't remember many international conferences that I've been to... where delegates were so serious, so well-attended, and so committed," he said.

"The main outcome of the conference is the appropriately titled Freeport Declaration on improving local government, the Common-wealth vision which is a document which is going to go to all of our local governments in the 53 Commonwealth countries worldwide for their active implementation."

"We call it the local government improvement agenda for the next ten years, we're seeing it as a strategy for the year 2010."

Among the key elements addressed in the Declaration are improving, for local governments, their financial base, local service delivery, community engagement, central-local operations, competency of councillors and officials and the effectiveness of local government associations. It also stressed the importance of regional cooperation in achieving the goals set forth by respective countries.

"We also looked at how the Commonwealth Local Government Forum... could support a culture of improvement in the Common-wealth and we looked at quite a lot of quite detailed and very practical proposals," he said.

Wright pointed out that the document should serve as a significant piece of work that highlights several issues facing local governments within the Commonwealth countries.

"We don't just have talking shops, we don't just have nice get-togethers where people produce long documents which nobody reads, this document is really a highly important political statement which will be taken up by local governments and ministries thoughout the Comonwealth," he said.

Following the afternoon CLGF meetings yesterday evening, all delegates were invited to a closing reception at the Count Basie Sqaure in Port Lucaya where they were entertained by a host of local performers and viewed a Junkanoo presentation by students of Walter Parker Primary School