City residents benefit from housing outreach
Scores of Central Georgetown residents on Saturday, capitalised on Government’s core home support and home improvement subsidies offer, via an outreach held in Roxanne Burnham Gardens.
During the outreach held by the Ministry of Housing and Water’s Central Housing and Planning Authority (CH&PA), persons were able to instantly apply for either initiative and have their interview conducted on the spot.
Minister within the Ministry of Housing and Water, Susan Rodrigues, M.P., said this initiative ensures the ministry’s 2000 home improvement subsidies and 250 core homes, are equitably dispersed. It is also in keeping with government’s manifesto promise to provide 50,000 house lots to Guyanese by 2025.
“We are seeing mostly applications for the home improvement subsidy and so we are happy to help those people who need their houses renovated and bring it up to a standard where they can live comfortably, but we are also accepting the core homes applications as well,” the Minister said.
This is the eighth exercise hosted to date, by the Housing Ministry for 2022. Thus far, communities served include: South Ruimveldt, Tucville, North Ruimveldt and sections of the East Coast of Demerara.
Minister Rodrigues is encouraging persons to take advantage of the services being offered by Government, as they seek to have Guyanese comfortably housed. This is also in keeping with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)- Goal 11 which seeks to ensure adequate, safe and affordable housing.
The programme’s home improvement subsidies feature, allows applicants to gain at least a grant of $500,000 worth of construction materials for repairs to walls, floors, electrical works and sanitation improvements and other non-cosmetic improvements, while, the core home support aims to establish 20ft x 20ft two-bedroom concrete homes for vulnerable households, including for single-parents.
The boundary currently encompasses the La Parfaite Harmonie Housing Development in Region Three; Georgetown to Grove on the East Bank of Demerara, Region Four; Georgetown to La Bonne Intention and 19 other select communities on the East Coast of Demerara, Region Four.
The Ministry’s Adequate Housing and Urban Accessibility Programme (AHUAP) is being funded by the Inter-American Development Bank. Under this programme, US$5M has been earmarked for home improvement subsidies while US$5M is catered for core home support.