The Ministry of the Environment has hired a consultant to spearhead its Community Areas Programme (CAP), the Minister said in the House of Assembly yesterday.

In a ministerial statement, also said CAP projects in 2006 included a new community centre, sports field and basketball court at Pig?s Field, off the Glebe Road.

?Before I update the Honourable Members on the progress of CAP projects, I would like to take this opportunity to note that Miss Judith Mills, a daughter of the soil, has been retained as a consultant by the Ministry of the Environment and has been charged with the responsibility of spearheading CAP projects, and catalysing community discussions on what they would like to see happen in their neighbourhoods,? Minister Butterfield said.

Miss Mills is a landscape architect by trade, Ms Butterfield said, with local and overseas experience.

?Her key duties will include meeting with community groups, designing and presenting architectural concepts and overseeing the implementation of such landscape designs,? she said. ?CAP is a partnership initiative where local residents are consulted extensively with regards to their ideas and wishes for improving their neighbourhood.

?The overall aim is to realise environmental improvements particularly in high density neighbourhoods,? she said.

Three other CAP parks were in the pipeline, she said, two with construction due to start in June, however, a Pig?s Field project was still in the planning stages.

Pig?s Field, on Band Lane, Pembroke, off the Glebe Road, was being spearheaded by the same body ? the North Village Trust Executive ?who spearheaded the first CAP project, the William F. Wilson park off St. Monica?s Road, Pembroke, finished in May 2005.

?At a recent meeting of the North Village Trust Executive, members were presented with a landscape conceptual plan as well as before and after photographic simulations,? Ms Butterfield said.

She said architects were now digitising the drawings to be presented to the North Village Trust by March 31.

Another Pembroke park was planned for the Ladies Chambers area, near West Pembroke School on North Shore Road.

?The concept is to landscape the area for residents to enjoy open space with spectacular views of the North Shore,? she said.

Several community meetings have already been held at West Pembroke School where residents were excited and engaged in the process, she said.

And in the east end, a dirt-filled slope in Harlem Heights in Hamilton Parish will be transformed into a children?s park, she said.

?Residents have been treated to a visual history of the area as well as a vision for the new park,? she said, while further community meetings are planned.

She said it should be put out to tender by March 31, but promised further CAP parks in the future with support from the public.

?We plan to encourage neighbourhoods to come together and assess what environmental improvements can be made in their immediate area,? she said. ?I note that several phone calls were received at Ministry Headquarters this week from residents enquiring about CAP.?