Housing officials for Essequibo Coast outreaches

Persons with pending housing and land matters along the Essequibo Coast will soon have these issues resolved as a high-level team from the Central Housing and Planning Authority will be conducting a series of meetings on Monday, October 12, 2020. The meetings will be held at the Charity Secondary School beginning at 9:00 hours; State House Anna Regina, 13:00 hours and Onderneeming, 15:00 hours.

These engagements are as a result of numerous complaints made by residents during an outreach over the weekend with Minister of Housing and Water, the Hon Collin Croal. Residents told the Minister that their monies have been tied up with the housing agency for years as they await solutions to their issues. In other instances, titles have not been forthcoming for them to proceed with financing and construction.  Additionally, there is the issue of persons being asked to repeatedly make an application for house lots because their information cannot be found in the agency’s database. The residents told Minister Croal they are at their wits’ ends with attending meetings just for documentation purposes and no solutions to their issues which have been ongoing for years.

Moving forward, the Minister recently announced that the entire Housing operations in Region Two will be revamped to better serve the needs of applicants. These upcoming meetings will aid in kick-starting this new way in which the agency delivers services. According to Minister Croal, a few policy decisions have been made in relation to addressing the issues in the region and this will commence with a massive data collection exercise. Following the data collection exercise, the agency’s database will be updated and persons will be dealt with in chronological order. Other policy decisions will guide the way matters are dealt with relating to the issuance of titles and transport and other land matters.

Over the coming months residents of Pomeroon/Supenaam (Region Two) will be better served by the Ministry of Housing and Water as plans are onstream for a more equipped and staffed regional Housing office. In the interim, the Ministry will continue its work in acquiring lands for distribution in the region and to complete infrastructure in existing schemes. The Government’s ambitious housing drive will see the allocation of 10,000 serviced lots annually. This vision will be realised through funding from Central Government and Public-Private Partnerships.