Both Oars In Helter Shelter

Sep 3, 2010

One of the first things I remember learning in science is that we require food, water and shelter to sustain our lives. Later, I learned from deeper study and life itself that we, since we are social beings, also require love. Rich or poor, old or young, we all have these four basic needs.

Given this reality, the world community’s rush to provide food, water, shelter and compassion to the victims of the January 12th earthquake that devastated Haiti was appropriate. The immediate response was aimed at these basic needs and it met them. We are all thankful for this timely and immense outpouring of assistance by nations and relief agencies around the world, too numerous to list, that surely saved lives, lessened misery and quelled anxieties in a nation that has suffered far too much already.

However, there comes a point after the immediate needs are met—at least at a basic level—when it is prudent to reassess the situation in order to determine what type of assistance is needed for real progress to be made. Unfortunately, all too often, massive relief actions, having taken on a life of their own, are allowed to go unchecked past this point. Inevitably, this leads to the waste. The blind rush by several well-respected world relief organizations to complete thousands and thousands of temporary shelters in Haiti is an example of this type of well-intentioned, but ineffective aid.

The urgency behind building temporary shelters stems from two valid concerns: first, there is doubt as to whether the ad hoc shelters constructed out of distributed tarps, tents, and scavenged materials by their occupants can withstand hurricane winds. Secondly, many of the camps are precariously situated on hillsides or in valleys that could become inundated with rain from even a passing hurricane, let alone a direct hit on Port au Prince.

Yet, the people who live in the camps have shown little interest in moving. Who can blame them? Hurricanes in Port au Prince are rare thanks to its location on the western end of the island. The new camps are located far from their daily activity and most of the shelters that have been built to date couldn’t pass for a rural school bus stop or a backyard toolshed in the US. Foolish or not, the ever optimistic, self-encamped Haitians prefer their make-shift, but well-located homes to the international community’s offer of tin roofed, plywood shanties in lala land regardless of the possible weather risk.

Undaunted by the fact that the locals have proven to be at least faster, if not better, at constructing temporary shelter, the stalwart band of international relief agencies marches on with their crisis housing plan. The Inter-Agency Standing Committee [IASC] website reports that the unrelenting team of loosely coordinated shelter builders from around the world, which includes several nationalities of the Red Cross, Islamic Relief, Habitat for Humanity, and an alphabet soup of lesser known refugee agencies, have committed to building a total of 137,982 shelters. Evidently, they just cannot give up the hope that if they build them, the people will come.

Given the group has only completed 14,000 units in seven months; it is unlikely that this fruitless goal will be met any time soon. But, if and when it is, at least $350 million dollars will have been burned up in the process. Surprisingly, dismal as they are, these shelters can cost as much as $2,500 a unit to build.

What else could be done with $350 million to address Haiti’s very real housing problem? This money could be used to create a guarantee fund to back mortgages for 30 to 40,000 modest permanent houses. Remarkably, you can build a safe, acceptable cement house in Haiti for $7,000 to $10,000.

Even with the deplorably high unemployment and equally deplorable low wages in this desperately impoverished country, there are plenty of hard working people in Haiti who could afford the monthly payments on a $10,000 loan amortized over ten years. Even if those who sign up to build are not currently living in the camps, they will be leaving rental properties and freeing up these houses to those who are stuck in the camps.

Jump starting the retail mortgage market at the lower end, which is nonexistent to date, will also create jobs in several sectors, such as construction, banking and retail. This will create more people capable of handling a mortgage or at least paying rent. With the risk of default covered by the fund, banks will have the incentive to finally solve the issue of currency fluctuation which has also impeded the mortgage market from getting started.

Some of this might be a dream, but it still beats building fields of bus stops that nobody is willing to get on the bus to go to.