The post Activists critique progress on inner-city social housing projects appeared first on Ndifuna Ukwazi’s ‘NU in the Media’.
by Ilze-Mari Van Zyl on August 5, 2023 @ www.capetownetc.com
The City of Cape Town has secured heritage approval for the old Woodstock Hospital – its largest inner-city social housing development yet.
Also read: It’s a go for Cape Town’s largest inner-city social housing project
Mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis says the heritage approval is a crucial milestone toward the design and submission of building plans for the site. ‘This is our single biggest social-housing proposal in the inner city, and it’s important that it proceeds, and now with heritage approval, we can proceed to planning and building-plan submission.’
‘Landing well-located affordable housing is a complex undertaking that finds itself between several fires: inadequate national subsidies; the unlawful occupation of project sites; and the obstacle of Cape Town’s largest, best-located properties being under national government ownership.’
The site has about 700 units and is currently being occupied by members of Reclaim the City, a housing asocial movement, the Southern Suburbs Tatler reports.
Housing activist group Ndifuna Ukwazi has welcomed the City’s efforts to release land in the inner city for affordable housing, although it says progress is long overdue, slamming claims that delays in building inner-city housing were due to building hijackings.
According to James Vos, acting mayoral committee member for human settlements, both the Woodstock Hospital and the provincially-owned Helen Bowden Nurses Home properties were subject to building hijacking by Ndifuna Ukwazi’s Reclaim the City campaign in early 2017 after the government announced plans to develop social housing in the area.
The Western Cape High Court granted an interdict and restraining Reclaim the City from ‘inciting persons to enter or be upon the property for the purpose of unlawfully occupying or invading’ in 2018, he says.
Vos adds that the property has favourable zoning and rights for social housing development, with the only challenge now being the ongoing unlawful occupation of the property. ‘The City is determined to proceed with the planning and development of social housing, as well as taking engagements forward with unlawful occupants to unlock social-housing development in the shortest possible time. There are now pending eviction proceedings following the Western Cape High Court granting the City an order to survey the number and individual circumstances of occupants.’
The old Woodstock Hospital has been renamed the Cissie Gool House by Reclaim the City members, who occupied it in 2017.
In response to the City’s statement, Ndifuna Ukwazi says while the organisation recognises the City’s efforts to accelerate the process of releasing land in the inner city, the process has taken a long time. ‘Some of these sites were actually identified as early as 2008 but still do not have a single affordable home on them.
‘How long will people still have to wait before actual construction happens? All levels of government must recognise the context in which people are forced to occupy land in the face of dire need, failed land reform, lack of affordable housing provision and lack of faith in (the) government’s will and ability to work together to develop affordable housing as illustrated in the case of the Tafelberg site, which remains undeveloped,’ says Yusrah Bardien, Ndifuna Ukwazi spokesperson.
‘It is dishonest that the City claims that the occupation is the biggest obstacle when it has failed to produce any inner-city affordable housing since the dawn of democracy. If anything, the recent progress should be partially attributed to activist pressure. It is only since activists increased the pressure that we have seen any progress. Several city projects with absolutely nothing to do with Cissie Gool House are on the verge of cancellation because of government failure, and they would do well to focus on this.’
According to the Southern Suburbs Tatler, the group tried to engage the City since 2017 but hasn’t been successful. ‘A number of invites have been sent to the City and its officials, including the current mayor. This has not been taken up. Recently we held a co-design exhibition at the Institute of Architecture in the city as a means to show what the ideas and thinking (are), taking place within the occupation. These initiatives are all part of our commitment to engage with the City. New commitments to engage with us are very welcome. We only hope it can be realised sooner rather than later,’ says Reclaim the City leader, Bevil Lucas.
Karen Hendricks, another Reclaim the City leader, says the City has a tendency of shifting blame for ‘its failure to build truly affordable well-located housing in the inner city’.
Woodstock and Salt River are two inner-city suburbs closest to the CBD geographically and historically have been diverse areas. Yet now they are plagued by rampant gentrification. It is a skeleton of its former character. Twenty-nine years into democracy cannot mean that a well-kept city like Cape Town still prioritises buildings over the people who have always lived here,’ she adds.
Hendricks notes that Reclaim the City campaigned for affordable, well-located housing and fought against the displacement of poor people from the inner city, adding that ‘We have turned this abandoned building into a home for poor and working-class families who would otherwise have been rendered homeless.’
According to Mayor Hill-Lewis, the first year of the mayoral priority programme for affordable housing land release saw to it that several sites received crucial City council land-release approvals, including:
- 200 units for Newmarket Street, Cape Town;
- 215 units for the Salt River Market; 600 units for Pickwick Street, Salt River;
- 180 units for the Fruit and Veg store site in the CBD; and
- 160 units for Earl Street, Woodstock.
Furthermore, the City enabled 130 social housing units in the inner-city feeder suburb of Pinelands for Phase One of the provincial governmental Conradie Park development, and the City is also providing support to the province’s Founder’s Garden precinct in the CBD.
