Squatting areas to get facelift

The Ministry of Housing and Urban Development through the office of the Commissioner of State Lands and the Land Settlement Agency (LSA) will be rolling out a programme aimed at providing more security for squatters while attempting to recoup costs for infrastructure development projects through the launch of the tenancy policy on Wednesday.

The policy would involve an upgrade in the quality of designated squatting areas by paving roads, building bridges and other much-needed developments while connecting squatters' houses with utilities. In return, the squatters would be required to pay 40 per cent of the cost of the development.

Speaking at the launch of the programme at the Ministry of Housing, South Quay, Port of Spain, Minister Edmund Dillon said the programme sought to take charge of rampant land fraud while providing a better standard of living for squatters.

Dillon said the number of squatters has exponentially increased in communities across TT and the programme would be the first step in offering a permanent solution to lack of housing for some squatters.

Citing estimates from the LSA, Dillon placed the number of people not eligible to secure a statutory lease for the land they occupy at 75 per cent, meaning government was unable to collect taxes from them.

"The 75 per cent of those people, for whatever reason, do not qualify for a certificate of comfort and cannot move to a statutory lease or deed but they are enjoying the benefits of the infrastructure. All the others, they are living in the same community but the government can only tax the 25 per cent. The other 75 per cent live for free, so there is imbalance in those communities."

He also warned that in order to qualify to benefit from the programme, applicants must meet certain criteria laid out by the ministry. The stipulations he said were put in place to avoid a "mad land grab" and ensure squatters were not doing damage to the environment.

"The policy will only apply to people who occupied the designated area up to and before June 14 2014, this is because the last aerial photography survey was done on this date.

"We have captured the image every single property at that time so if you come to us now and we don't have a photograph of your property then you cannot benefit from the policy and the reason why we're doing that is because we don't want a mad rush now for people to rush. You must satisfy these criteria."

During a presentation explaining the mechanics behind the programme, CEO of the LSA Hazard Hosein said the authority would be advertising which communities were being developed and would accept applications from prospective tenants.

Asked what the penalty would be for not paying the fees stipulated by the LSA, Hosein said errant tenants who failed to pay would not be granted a deed of lease.

"How this policy benefits the occupant is that you will never get a deed of lease which you can use to mortgage that property, which can be used to build a proper home, buy a car, send your children to school, so these are some of the advantages of paying and that's enough to encourage people to pay rather than be there, be a squatter and never have title to that land."

Dillon said the policy would also only apply to residential properties and not those approved for agricultural works.

Chairman of the Land Settlement Agency Osley Francis commended Dillon for his foresight in rolling out the programme which he said would benefit squatters greatly.

Referring to loans taken out by the government to pay for infrastructural works in these designated squatting communities, he said the collection of fees would assist in recouping these expenses.