Last week’s floods dealt a new blow to the Social Security Board’s troubled Joes Hill Manor Estate when a parking lot collapsed onto the walkway to an apartment building there.
Like most of the $27 million development, the building appears to be unoccupied, but the collapse compounded previous concerns about earlier landslides and raised new questions about the safety of the 52 homes the SSB has been struggling to sell since mid-2022.
Answers to those questions, however, have not been forthcoming.
The SSB has not provided any information about the concrete collapse, and SSB Director Jeanette Scatliffe-Boynes told the Beacon on Monday, May 13, that she was unavailable for an interview.
SSB Chairman Glenroy Forbes and his predecessor Ian Smith did not return messages, and neither did former SSB Director Antoinette Skelton or project contractor James Todman.
Health and Social Minister Vincent Wheatley, whose portfolio includes the SSB, told the Beacon on May 13 that he had been out of the territory until the previous night and was awaiting a report on the incident.
“I have been briefed on this and many other instances of damage caused by the rains,” Mr. Wheatley wrote in a message. “I have not seen a report as yet, so I am not in a position to speak about it or any other damaged property.”
Safety implications unclear
Amid officials’ silence, the extent of the damage and the potential cost and safety implications are not clear.
What is clear is that anyone who had been walking under the parking lot — which is designed much like several other parking lots in the development — could have been killed by the collapse.
As of Sunday, May 12, fallen concrete, rocks, dirt and other debris largely filled the walkway and pressed against the building’s wall and at least one window. Nearby, a retaining wall was also cracked and displaced.
Additionally, a section of road above the building was partially undermined, and on May 12 it was blocked off by three orange cones connected with yellow caution tape.
Previous landslides
The incident is not the first flood damage at the development.
Last October, heavy rains from Tropical Storm Philippe carved away large sections of the mountainside directly below some of the newly constructed housing units.
Boulders and dirt tumbled over retaining walls into the development’s winding road, damaging two vehicles parked near the only home with visible signs of occupation at the time.
SSB Deputy Director Lorie Freeman — who did not respond to requests for comment this week — told the Beacon last October that the flood damage from Philippe did not come as a major surprise.
Earlier rains, she said, had shown that remedial works were needed at the estate, which James Todman Construction completed 13 months early and handed over to the SSB in June 2022. Since the start of 2023, Ms. Freeman said, the SSB had been seeking a proposal that would include securing the steep hillsides.
“We’ve known we would have to heighten some of those [retaining] walls that are aligned to the road, but the walls that are directly behind most of the homes … seem to have did what we were expecting,” she said last October.
Ms. Freeman added at the time that the SSB would know more after receiving reports from two firms that were solicited to propose a way forward.
However, Ms. Freeman also said at the time that many decisions about the project’s future remained in limbo without a full SSB board in place to decide the way forward.
February HOA update
By February, the SSB was still awaiting a “full complement” of board members, according to information provided by Mr. Wheatley in a House of Assembly meeting that month.
The minister added at the time that the board was expected to be fully appointed by March and that it would then move ahead with plans to limit the SSB’s liability for the Joes Hill project by transferring the development’s assets to a holding company that had already been incorporated.
Asked this week for an update on the board appointments and the transfer plan, Mr. Wheatley forwarded a message stating, “Effective May 8 we have 8/9 members. The assets have not yet been transferred to a holding company.”
Sales struggles
The flooding issues have compounded ongoing problems at the development as the SSB has struggled to sell the homes as planned.
The project was initially advertised as “affordable” housing for first-time homeowners, but after the SSB began marketing the units — at prices ranging from $275,900 for a one-bedroom condo to $625,000 for the largest three-bedroom townhouse — buyers didn’t materialise as hoped.
In fact, they barely materialised at all.
Last June, the government relaxed the application criteria to allow non-first-time-homeowners to purchase the homes as rental units. But sales remained sluggish.
In the HOA last September, Mr. Wheatley provided a sales update. Though more than 600 applicants had expressed interest in the homes in the early stages of the project, very few had stepped up to make a purchase, he said, adding that the SSB was unlikely to see a return on its investment.
“To date, two homes have been sold,” Mr. Wheatley said on Sept. 7. “A total of 50 homes remain unsold, and eight applicants are presently in negotiations with the bank.”
Last October, Ms. Freeman told the Beacon that sales numbers were up since Mr. Wheatley’s statement the previous month: Four units had been sold, and about 10 other prospective buyers were in negotiations to purchase others, she said in an Oct. 10 interview.
The purchased units — which include standalone three-bedroom homes and one two-bedroom home — were sold at full price to first-time homeowners who intend to live on the property, she said. To help facilitate further sales, at least two VI banks were offering financing up to 100 percent, according to Ms. Freeman.
‘People thought they could just apply’
Despite the four purchases, Ms. Freeman acknowledged in October that the SSB was far behind where it had hoped to be on home sales.
“I think when the homes were launched, persons had the wrong impression of … the costing and so forth,” she said, adding, “When it was initially launched, the costing wasn’t there, so people thought they could just apply. But after the costing came out and persons realised they have to actually qualify via the bank, that changed the dynamics of the public perception in terms of what they thought it was.”
The units’ prices were set by the SSB board after consultations with experts, according to Ms. Freeman.
“We went out and I think we got analysis done by various real estate agents from around the territory,” she said last October. “That was a main component. We looked at the costs, of course, and some other elements. So there were quite a bit of calculations that were done in collaboration with the experts within those fields. And they came up with the prices.”
Documents not provided
She declined to provide the Beacon with this analysis — or with the cost-benefit analysis, business case, and engineering study she said she believes were carried out for the project — but she agreed to seek the SSB board’s approval to release all this information.
“It all depends on if we get approval to give them to you,” she said. “Obviously, there’s no obligation to provide those documents.”
Seven months later, the SSB has provided no documents related to the project.
On the afternoon of May 12, the development appeared mostly deserted, with vehicles parked next to only two buildings. Aside from the concrete collapse, no other obvious damage was visible.