Barbados Member of Parliament Kirk Humphrey has announced a slate of targeted constituency development projects for St Michael South, all centered on expanding economic and community opportunities for the region’s young entrepreneurs and residents. The lawmaker laid out the full scope of the upcoming initiatives during his constituency branch’s annual general meeting held Sunday, emphasizing that unlocking youth potential remains his top policy priority for the area.
One of the most advanced projects on the agenda is a new business empowerment hub, developed in partnership with the country’s Ministry of Youth, Sports and Community Development. Slated for construction on Jessamine Avenue in Bayville, the facility is designed to support early-stage small business owners in skilled trades including hairdressing, barbering, and automotive repair. With a site already secured, full funding approved, and architectural blueprints finalized, Humphrey confirmed that construction will kick off in the coming months, with capacity to host up five emerging entrepreneurs at the facility as they grow their operations.
In addition to the trade-focused hub, the constituency will gain a standalone community empowerment center, a long-awaited public space that St Michael South has never had. The planned facility will sit at the intersection of Villa Road and Brittons New Road, where the government is currently in the process of acquiring the required land. Currently, St Michael South shares public community space with neighboring St Michael Central and Christ Church West, a barrier that Humphrey says discourages local young people from accessing programming offered in the shared space. He also noted that once the area’s existing primary school relocates to its new campus, the vacated school hall will be repurposed for additional education and training programming, in collaboration with the Ministry of Educational Transformation’s training division, expanding public resources for constituents even further.
In a nod to local sporting history, Humphrey confirmed that Cabinet has approved a plan to rename the Bayland netball and basketball courts located outside Bay Primary School to honor the Banfield sisters, iconic figures in Caribbean netball. A public renaming ceremony is scheduled for mid-July to mark the change.
Finally, the representative announced a long-overdue major reconstruction project for the notoriously damaged sloping roadway in Reece Land, an issue that has plagued the community for more than two decades. Engineering assessments are already complete, but the project will require relocating four residential properties to accommodate the realigned, improved road. Working alongside the Ministry of Housing and the National Housing Corporation, the government is currently coordinating relocation support for the affected homeowners, and Humphrey says his team is working diligently to advance the project with the goal of breaking ground and completing reconstruction before the end of the calendar year.