At the intersection of Agnes Way and Crewe Road is the Lyndhurst Apartments, a dilapidated government-owned complex. The dusty, decrepit single-storey building has, for years, served as centre stage for an unseen struggle between its tenants and the government.
The tenants are clients of the Department of Children and Family Services and the Needs Assessment Unit. Together, the departments pay for the rent and utilities, and supply food vouchers for the authorised occupants. Now, for health and safety reasons, the departments are trying to relocate the tenants.
A government statement, released on Friday, 20 Dec., said the struggle to find the tenants suitable accommodations dates back to 2016. Since then, notifications were “re-issued to remaining occupants in November 2018 and early 2019”.
On Friday, 13 Dec., a DCFS-led operation at the premises was carried out. They were supported by police and fire officers, as well as animal welfare officers from the Department of Agriculture. Armed with a court-sanctioned eviction notice, the group breached the door of one of the units, which is thought to have housed an elderly lady.
However, at the time, no one was home. While at the scene, Cayman Compass staff overheard occupants in the adjacent units saying the woman had moved out the night before.
The government statement dismissed claims that an eviction took place at the site, saying “at no time has anyone been evicted, left homeless or without suitable accommodations”.
The statement said the struggle, which has been a “necessarily sensitive and protracted process”, has been perpetuated by resistance from tenants who are “reluctant to vacate the premises”.
But the reluctance on the part of the tenants is only half of the government’s battle. A further lack of cooperation by landlords who are unwilling to house NAU clients, only serves to worsen the situation.
“The lack of available properties and landlords who are willing to accept payments from the NAU is problematic,” Premier Alden McLaughlin said in the statement.
In recent years, many landlords have chosen no longer to accept NAU clients for a variety of reasons. Internal protocol has created significant bureaucracy that requires multiple stages for payments to be processed, for example. The subsequent result is that payments can be delayed for months.
It is unclear how many people currently reside in the remaining homes at the Lyndhurst complex, as it is thought that multiple people reside in the homes alongside the approved tenants.
Premier McLaughlin said he remains hopeful that a solution will be found.
“With the remaining clients, we are happily nearing completion of our shared goal to have them all comfortably housed,” he said, “I want to thank our teams for their hard work and in pulling out all the stops to achieve this for them. We continue to urge landlords with available rental properties to contact the NAU soon as possible.”
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Since 2016? it could have been rebuilt or repaired 10 times already.
Where were they going to “ relocate” that elderly lady? I don’t see a moving truck ready to help her with the “relocation”.
Forcibly entering premises is not a relocation, it is an eviction.
Merry Christmas everyone.
For decades CIG has punished those who did not keep up with the booming economy, although the people had no knowledge of what to expect nor any guidance on how to manage their money when the “boom” did begin; one thing they were taught was the indoctrination of “the foreign investor”; no one told us that we could become investors, too.
CIG did not prepare Caymanians at start of the growing economic boom, many of whom are now senior citizens and now they and their generations being negatively affected by this lack of preparation. There was no strong growth in the education structure to equip Caymanian students in finance here in the country, there were no community programs that taught about investing money; there still do not exist community teachings on “make a little, save a little, have a lot” simply because we do not know those principles to teach them. My people perish for the lack of knowledge.
The more we progress the less benefit there are for Caymanians it seems, and more are comparing their situation to prisoners stating that “at least in prison I will have shelter and three meals a day with access to health services”. Although our detention centres and yes, Northward Prison, have been condemned as “deplorable” they are now the envy for some Caymanians who are entitled to food, water, shelter and medical care, all provisioned for in all human rights charters. We should all be alarmed that prison is viewed by the homeless as a means of relief from hunger and the elements. This is the degree of hopelessness and helplessness being experienced in this country by many.
CIG’s response years ago was not to provide a cure for the growing canker but to cover it with a band-aid called “NAU”; what it did was remove the ability for one to say the government had not recognized that there were “needs” in the country and did not have a “unit” to “assess” those needs.
But that was and remains the extent of CIG’s desire and actions to assist Caymanians who, for whatever reason, has fallen in need (let us all be mindful that none alone is an island): they put together a unit – mostly unqualified for the purpose since its inception – that has lacked the manpower needed to be an effective body including for payments and enforcements. For many years, NAU, an understaffed, underfunded, overpressured unit itself has been wailing for help.
This is which is very unfortunate in one of the world’s top financial centres, an amazing feat considering that we are also one of its smallest populations in that arena; these two factors prove that arresting the current problem is easily achievable – if it were the goal of the government.
Are there clients who have built a negative image of NAU clientele? Yes. But this does not seem to be the major reason for the rejection by landlords of NAU applicants that I have experienced; it has been the unnecessary financial risk that property owners, many of whom have mortgages, become exposed to as a contractual party with NAU. I have assisted many persons in this country with the NAU application and follow-up process and I have witnessed the withdrawal of landlords from this program based most often on one demise: unpredictable, untimely financial payments. A common response to engaging in a rental agreement has now become “not unless the money is coming from you each month and you wait to collect from NAU” (NAU does not allow this particular arrangement either, according to my latest correspondence with them regarding housing for a stroke victim).
CIG has acted so unlawfully with the management of NAU that the headlining of this situation is now our international disgrace. We have further appended our name to include not just “one of the top ten financial centers in the world”, but further appended to “with one of its poorest social structures”.
There really does not exist a justification for the level of desperation in this country, unless poor leadership is the truth we want to justify. Maybe in this coming hew year, the hearts of the politicians who are living in larger houses, fatter than at their arrival to the LA and doesn’t know the pinch of the gas bill will put the poor people of the country first who voted them in to make a change in the country and therefore their desperate situation.
The annual Christmas turkey is not sufficient for the year…especially when you have to place to cook it.
Well said.
With the exception of sick and elderly, are these dependent folks giving back in the way of work of any kind. If not, why not. They are just handed money vouchers, and live rent free. Governments can’t afford to support folks who are able bodied, and can give back. Long gone are the days of handouts, or should be. Money is too tight, as this piece illustrates with substandard housing. Let’s help these people help themselves. There may be some very talented folks whose talents aren’t being tapped.
Typical to blame victims.
What level of education this country offers? Where are trade schools, adult learning centers, children and adults learning disabilities addressing programs?
Just because one completed 8 grades 20 years ago doesn’t mean he will be able to hold, let alone succeed in 2019. Skills become obsolete really fast. Who trains whose who are not sick or elderly to meet 21century jobs requirements? Mental abilities decline with age. It is harder for Even 45 years old person to learn new technology, programs, systems. Where can they get annual updates? Nearly all and every job requires to stay current with technology. So these people choose to hide their shortcomings in order not to look stupid and compete with youngsters. CIG completely failed these people.
You are on target with training, education etc, and I think the country appreciates the open acknowledgement that the CIG failed them, as that is the truth, further highlighted by your question regarding their employment (taking our eyes off the senior citizen situation for now).
How will the government ensure that they are suitable for employment? NWDA is also a band-aid at one time handling more than 800 clients with 12 staff including the Director, an administratively impossible feat. How can we expect that Caymanians would get training and a fair opportunity to qualify in a system such as that?
If they lost their job with all the competing work permit holders in the country, what is the mathematical probability that they will get one? CIG is trying to support NAU applicants at an average of more than $13K per year, in order to process a permit fee at $2,500.00 per year. There are many who are waiting for a response from NAU and sleeping on the beaches, behind dumpsters, under car ports at commercial buildings; that response is not likely to happen because as we know, NAU is “lacking the necessary resources”. In the meantime, CIG publishes the income earned from work permits to the public so that it can appear that work permits are beneficial to the country while Caymanians hide in the dark so that no one knows the truth about where they are sleeping.
But if we were truly benefiting from work permit processing we would have a stable NAU/NWDA work relationship, proper education and world class health care. The CIG is failing us all around.
“The government statement dismissed claims that an eviction took place at the site” ….
but
Better to see something once than to hear about it a thousand times. The above photo speaks for itself, “relocation Caymanian style with mallet in hand”. LOL
George Nowak or Jake Fuller, pay attention.