Habitat seeks to become redundant

JENNIFER Massiah, national director of Habitat for Humanity (HH), said the organisation’s strategy is to make themselves redundant. She said it is the the goal of every civil sector organisation worth its salt, to shift systems so there is no longer any need for its presence.

Massiah was presenting a report on HH’s activities for the last fiscal year at the organisation’s annual general meeting on Wednesday at the Arthur Lok Jack Global School of Business, Mt Hope.

She admitted that this fiscal year review was one of her toughest in her 17 years with HH due to a difficult economic climate which led to a steep decline in donor contributions, some staff attrition and an increase in the number of people asking for shelter.

She said the October 2018 floods exacerbated the complexities of the need and demanded that they find the means to help as best as they could.

“Just one short week after our good friend Terry Rondon from Sangre Grande stood in the auditorium next door and pledged the continued support of corporation for our building programme, he called me very late on Saturday night to ask for help in his devastated community.

“There were several times during this year, when we moved on faith alone, trusting in God to provide whatever we needed, whenever we needed it, in the amount needed. But we had no need to fear. My staff and I know from first-hand experience that Habitat for Humanity is God’s extended hand on the earth and He provides accordingly.”

Massiah said with the Disaster Response and Recovery experience they had supported with the expertise of their Latin and Caribbean (LAC) office based in Costa Rica, they completed 80 repair projects in Dominica.

She said while HH did not build as many new houses as it would have liked, they increased the number of shelter solutions in a single given year, serving 130 families, 19 per cent above target.

She said while staffing changes hit HH’s Global Village programme hard, they were still able to achieve 62 per cent of its donation target from this critical sector.

Massiah said last weekend, HH was invited by the Housing Ministry to craft and participate in a panel discussion on disabilities and housing, and found themselves listed in the ministry’s new “Housing 101” manual as the only non-State agency endorsed by the ministry as a national resource for housing and land tenure access!

“We didn’t just snatch victory from the jaws of defeat, we put defeat in a time out and warned it not to trouble our souls again. With God’s help, we are declaring that we will move from strength to strength, growing our disaster resiliency programmes.” Since 1997, HH has served 877 families with shelter solutions - new houses, repairs, renovations, completions - and trained 4,951 people. It has also supported almost 25,000 people in their quest for safe, decent, adequate and affordable shelter.