PAC blames State for leap in squatting

An ongoing rise in squatting was blamed by the failure of several state agencies to work together to enforce the law, said the Public Accounts Committee’s (PAC) recent report on the Land Settlement Agency (LSA), whose role is to regularise eligible squatters.

The report lamented a failure to enforce existing laws by agencies such as the Commissioner of State Lands (COSL), Regional Corporations, and the Town and Country Division.

“These powers if exercised effectively will greatly assist in the containment of the unabated escalation of squatters,” said the report.

The report said TT has 55,000 squatting households, across 30 regularised sites and 14 sites where work has developed.

It said the LSA’s task to regularise squatters was “huge and daunting.” While it is the role of the COSL and corporations to remove squatting structures, most data on squatting is held by the LSA, with the report thus urging more co-operation between these agencies.

The report gave some recommendations. “The MHUD (Ministry of Housing and Urban Development) should show zero tolerance for squatting in remote areas of state forest lands, forest reserves and other protected areas designated under the National Forest and Protected Areas Policy for TT 2011.

“LSA should request support from the TT Police Service for instances where disputes arise from squatters refusing to relocate fences and other property effective immediately.” The report listed the LSA’s challenges. Some squatters withhold details from the LSA, while others do not comply with orders to relocate to be within their true boundaries.

Some structures encroach onto other lots or rights of way. Issues of ownership include succession, illegal transfer of rights, and “rentals” of structure/land by absentee owners. The report said the LSA mulled the safety of its field officers. “With the majority of the field officers being female, they have to go out by themselves mostly unarmed and without a security detail and must interact with squatters on a daily basis without any form of protection.”

Some squatters were unable to pay a premium to advance their tenure status. The report said patterns of irregular settlement by squatters make it hard to apply proper planning and engineering standards required to get the approval of agencies such as regional corporations, WASA and T&TEC.

“Only once approvals have been granted will the beneficiaries be able to receive a lease.” LSA said physical challenges such as the type of terrain, the closeness of structures and a lack of passageways makes it hard to improve infrastructure.

Constraints on developing infrastructure include resistance by squatters to relocate or remove hindrances such as crops or fences when they are obstructing the construction of roads and drains. Another problem is very high development costs of water installation, electrification, sewer systems, drainage, roads and fire hydrants in some areas owing to remoteness, location on hillsides or high population density.