The Recovery and Development Agency last Thursday held a conference for bidders interested in repairing homes and erecting temporary housing structures on Tortola, Anegada and Jost Van Dyke. RDA Head of Procurement John Primo said 13 homes have been identified for repairs: eight in Tortola, four in Jost Van Dyke and one in Anegada.
Each location had a bidder’s conference where contractors could visit and see the extent of the repairs required.
For four of those homes, the residents will have to live in temporary housing units while the repairs are being done.
The units are meant to be used for a “couple of years,” said Colene Penn, the RDA’s head of communications.
The dome-like structure will be similar to the Pancake Paradise building on Wickhams Cay, she added.
The beneficiaries have been selected by the Ministry of Health and Social Development’s Housing Recovery Assistance Programme as people who are in need of facilities, and the temporary structures will “ease and facilitate that process while they get their lives back on track more fully, to make life more accommodating,” Ms. Penn said.
Contractors, she said, will bid on the structures in “packages,” with the homes on Tortola and Anegada making up one package and the homes on JVD making up another.
It’s unclear how the residents were selected for the homes, or how many residents are still without housing. The RDA directed questions on the matter to the Ministry for Health and Social Development, and a HSD representative directed questions to the RDA.
Health and Social Development Minister Carvin Malone said at the House of Assembly sitting on May 17 that of the 543 applications to the Housing Recovery Assistance Programme since January 2018, 130 had been approved.