Dear Editor,
I was hoping that we would have kept Pearnel Charles Jr and his portfolio the Ministry of Housing, Urban Renewal, Environment and Climate Change.
It would have been good to have the Real Estate Board, Commission of Strata Corporations, Housing Agency of Jamaica, National Housing Trust, National Environment and Planning Agency and urban planners working together to ensure proper housing and proper cities. The synergy would have been used for the better, especially in the hands of a capable minister, such as Pearnel Charles Jr.
But my new year's hope was dashed for 2022 when I heard that in the Cabinet reshuffle Prime Minister Andrew Holness swallowed up the entire ministry into one "superministry", the Ministry of Economic Growth and Job Creation (MEGJC), over which he presides in tandem with other ministers without portfolio, while also maintaining his roles as defence minister and quasi-head of State.
Robert Montague was put in charge of the housing, land, and urban renewal portfolios in the MEGJC, but controversy caught up to him and those shoes are now vacant.
How can we make affordable housing and properly planned cities a reality when the long-term plans of the regulatory bodies and the portfolio minister gets sabotaged and killed off by short-term politicking?
Instead of having a dedicated ministry with a set goal and target, we have a ministry being tossed back and forth.
Therefore, I would like to ask the Holness Administration and other successive administrations if a plan will be developed to establish a permanent Ministry of Housing, Urban Renewal, Environment and Climate Change, where the Real Estate Board, Commission of Strata Corporations, Housing Agency of Jamaica, National Housing Trust, National Environment and Planning Agency, and the National Land Agency can foster greater cooperation so that the targets of affordable housing, sustainable development, and properly planned and built cities can be a reality, instead of the current reality in which urban planning is all over the place while an acute low-income housing crisis plagues the country.
Marcus White
whitemarc918@gmail.com
