Minister of State in the Ministry of Public Works, Public Utilities and the Digital Economy, Chekira Lockhart-Hypolite has announced that over 69 million dollars was distributed across 386 beneficiaries under the Housing Recovery Project.
She made the announcement during the handing over ceremony of 22 new resilient homes to families in Bellevue Chopin on Monday. She represented Minister for Housing and Urban Development, Melissa Poponne-Skerrit.
The World Bank made funding available for the project.
“Over $69 million dollars was distributed across 386 beneficiaries,” she revealed. “One of the major challenges under this project was land ownership.”
According to her, many beneficiaries did not meet the requirements for a clear title.
“Through this program, the ministry regularized land titles for 170 families, free of cost,” she said. “The government covered the surveying and registration fees so they could receive their titles and not miss out on this opportunity of a brand new home.”
Furthermore, Lockhart-Hypolite noted that at the beginning, each beneficiary was to receive only $50,000, but that was not enough to build secure, comfortable homes that met Dominica’s resilience vision.
“With the leadership of the Prime Minister, we revised the grant upward to $141,000, with final units costing $151,000,” she explained. “This was necessary, [because] building back better demands real investment.”
Meanwhile, Finance Minister Dr. Irving McIntyre, who represented Prime Minister Roosevelt Skerrit, remarked, “These 22 homes form part of the thousands of housing interventions delivered by this administration over the past several years,” he said. “They represent thoughtful planning, responsible governance, and strategic investment in the well-being of our citizens.”
He indicated that the Government of Dominica will continue with its housing agenda.
“This is not a one-off intervention, this is a sustained methodological and deliberate programme,” Dr. McIntyre emphasized.
He added, “This administration has made housing a central pillar of national development, because we understand that safe shelter is a human right and a foundation for economic and social advancement.”
Moreover, Dr. McIntyre pointed out that when speaking of development in Dominica, “we are not speaking about abstract concepts.”
“We are talking about families having a safe place to sleep at night. We are talking about mothers no longer worrying about the strength of their roofs or the stability of their walls,” he said. “We are talking about children able to study, elders able to live peacefully, and individuals able to focus on their goals because their basic need for safe shelter has been met.”
And we cannot afford to purchase a treadmill to do a cardiac stress test at the hospital…. magway sa!
first our government has outsourced the work by making MMCE developers of those state projects, this means that MMCE owns those projects and it was not ran or managed by the ministry or the minister but by foreign entity of MMCE, who is an unnecessary middle man in this process of providing much needed assistance to some residents. of this 69 million most of it went to the developer and consultant in MMCE. solutions which are slow and mostly send our money to foreign countries not serving our economy. Dominica with a construction boom should have a strong economy but this is not the case as we are regarded as one of the weakest economies in the region since we outsource everything.
69 million dollars was distributed across 386.
69 Million for 386 people? Does that make any financial sense? sure folks needs secure housing, but this is a VAST waste of Money…. it does not take 151,000 to build a hurricane safe house. what did ya’ll REALLy do with the money?
Another mis-managed budget – bunch of idiots
oh smart politicians….u spent 69 million…right? and is is brought by to the treasury? not one penny… is this not smart for votes? giving people who are able to pay?these are the same who go and have a brand new vehicle at those apartments….when those apartments need repairs u all will waste again ? u all are the smartest politicians on earth…just for votes …