NIA CHARLESTOWN NEVIS (January 27, 2021) — The Nevis Water Department (NWD) in the Nevis Island Administration (NIA) will host a staff retreat for the first time since the NIA was established 37 years ago.

Ms. Tonya Bartlett from Brown Hill, a Civil Engineer by profession, is the department’s first female manager.  She told the Department of Information in an interview on January 26, 2021, that the event is intended to, among other things, bring staff together and to get them involved.

“We will be having this on Tuesday February 02, 2021 at the Nevis Performing Arts centre (NEPAC) and we are hoping to start around 9 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. The whole objective of this retreat is to discuss plans and the expectations for the rest of the year.

“It will also help us to uplift our staff and show appreciation to them. Give them a time to meet each other, interact and share stories or whatever else that would like to do. I think it will help us start the year on a good foot.

Ms. Bartlett explained that another objective of the retreat has to do with communication.

“The whole objective is to communicate because we have had some issues in the past with communication, and I think this is something that we need to work on and involve staff more.

“It will help to jumpstart pretty much the year and the whole communication process to have staff involved in the processes in the whole department, so they just don’t feel like ‘oh we are just here and we just show up to work’. They actually have an input in the whole department. So it’s our department, not just my department,” she said.

In response to how she saw herself leading the department as the first woman, Ms. Bartlett noted that for her part gender plays no role.

“I don’t really play the gender thing. I just see it as a role and I have a plan and objectives of what I would like to see done with the department and where I would like to see us in the next five years.

“So it’s not really gender per se, it’s just this is a job and this is what we need to do in order to serve the people better. So it’s not really gender specific in my eyes. I don’t really see that,” she said.