– bidding process to commence this week

SIXTY Lindeners are one step closer to owning their own home constructed by the Central Housing and Planning Authority (CHPA) as the bidding process for contracts is to commence this week.

Minister of Communities with responsibility for housing, Valarie Patterson–Yearwood, told the Guyana Chronicle on Monday that all infrastructure including the grading of roads, the provision of water and electricity as well as the clearing of the land have been completed for the commencement of construction of the single unit houses.
Sixty of these–30 flat houses and 30 on stilts–will be built in Amelia’s Ward new housing scheme. While it was the ministry’s intention to construct duplexes in Linden, further consultation with residents highlighted their preference for the single housing units. CHPA has already prequalified owners for the houses and according to the minister, as each house is completed, the owner will be able to move in.

The flat housing units cost $5.3 while the elevated ones cost $6.3 M. “We already prequalified persons since last year, people were carrying their letters to the bank…as we complete building, people will move in,” Patterson–Yearwood said. As it relates to the housing units to be constructed at Wisroc, Wismar, Linden, she said that the process is currently at getting the lands transferred from the Wisroc Housing Cooperative via the Guyana Lands and Survey Commission. “The Co-op was defunct, so they had to form a sub-committee and through that committee, a registration process was done. The matter is now with Lands and Surveys; when that is transferred, we are ready to do,” Patterson–Yearwood said.

Priority was given to youths and government workers in Linden as scores of residents flocked the Linden CHPA Office with their applications. During a Linden outreach, Patterson–Yearwood said that she along with her team were prompted to undertake this housing unit project, given the demand for turnkey homes, not only in Linden but countrywide with their research seeing approximately 8500 individuals expressing serious interest. This, she said, will cut infrastructure cost on the government. The CHPA has inducted millions of dollars into constructing housing units across Guyana. The first set of houses built at Perseverance, EBD, by CHPA has been sold out. Several other communities across Guyana are expected to benefit.