These new houses in Riverton Meadows are being built under phase 1 of the National Housing Development Corporation's Operation PRIDE project. -Ian Allen photoTeino Evans, Staff Reporter
AMIDST THE rundown buildings, open lots littered with garbage and pools of stagnant water, there is a glimmer of hope that things will get better for residents of the Riverton City community in Kingston.
For many Jamaicans, 'River-ton' is synonymous with 'garbage dump' but the people who live there are proud of the progress and development taking place in their community.
STILL MUCH WORK TO BE DONE
One resident explained that living conditions have improved significantly over the past couple of years, but contends that there is still much work to be done.
"Some parts have improved like the housing scheme, but there are other areas like the lack of street lights, bad roads, and the stench from the dumps at night that need to be addressed," she said.
Other residents have also said that there has been a major reduction in violence in the community, as "persons now have jobs on the dump".
Junior Rowe, head of the St. Patrick's Foundation Centre in Riverton noted that "since the landfills, quite a few residents got jobs down there." These persons, he said, also had the privilege of being sent to school. Some received formal training in operating the weighting system that garbage trucks now had to go through. One resident even attended the Caribbean Institute of Business.
Another welcomed change, the residents said, was that known criminals had either emigrated to England or the United States.
The community of Riverton City is located just off Spanish Town Road in the vicinity of Weymouth Drive in Kingston. It lies in the Western St. Andrew constituency represented by People's National Party MP, O.T. Williams.
WELL NEEDED FACE-LIFT
For some time now, a number of business entities and organisations have been investing in the area, giving it a well needed face-lift.
When persons drive along the Spanish Town main road, they no longer see a vast land mass of slums and dilapidated board houses. Due to recent housing developments, like Operation PRIDE, a project of the National Housing Development Corpora-tion (NHDC), Riverton City is now resembling a community similar to others in the country.
NEW HOUSES
To date, the NHDC has completed 87 of the targeted 250 housing units that they had planned to build for phase 1 of the project. More than 20 residents from Riverton are now housed in these units. Other occupants of these new houses, have come from communities outside of Riverton, like Old Harbour, Spanish Town and Portmore.
Some persons have complained, however, that they can't afford to pay the deposits and monthly mortgages on the new houses.
"I am working and can hardly afford to pay the mortgage," said one resident who had been living in Riverton for more than 20 years. She noted that because of the high rates other persons from Riverton, the majority of whom are not working, have had to resort to staying in their board houses.
"The MPs need to work more closely with the people," said another. When the houses became available in (August 2001) residents were required to pay a deposit of $130,000 (for 1 bedroom) or $157,000 (for 2 bedrooms) in addition to $7,100 per month for mortgages. Since the increase in insurance, they now have to pay a total of $8,000 in monthly mortgage.
"I have two children going to school, and one just starting September, where I going to find that plus school fee," said another resident.
Riverton City has also benefited from projects run by the St. Patrick's Foundation, which has been working in the community for the past 20 years.
PROJECTS
Operating on a $4.9 billion budget (sponsored largely from local and overseas entities) St. Patrick's has been running a number of projects from its 12 Ferguson Drive location in Riverton City. They have established an early childhood peer and development programme, a computer training lab, and a health clinic.
At present, the early childhood programme has more than 100 students, and caters for children between the ages of three and six years old. According to Mr. Rowe, these students do not have to worry about their next meal, as Berger Paints Limited has sponsored a breakfast programme, and Industrial Gas Limited (IGL) are sponsors of their lunch programme.
While proudly showing off the centre's new computer lab, Mr. Rowe said that "of the five centres operated by the St. Patrick's Foundation, this was the only centre that we do not need to have security, because we involve the residents and let them know that this is for them, they are stakeholders in it."
COMPUTER TRAINING
Come September, residents in the Riverton community can look forward to a computer training programme which will run for eight weeks. The aim of this programme, Mr. Rowe says, is to prepare persons for the level 1 computer programme at HEART. The more than 20 adults who have already registered for the programme, will attend classes twice per week, where they will learn basic computer skills and programme operations like Microsoft Word and Spreadsheet. Already, the Foundation has hired a qualified graduate from the University of Technology as an instructor.
But despite the developments, the issue of pollution and other health hazards still dog Riverton City. Residents in nearby communities have also become concerned about the possible effects that air pollution stemming from the dump can cause. According to one resident in Washington Gardens, "At nights, smoke from the dump clogs the air we breathe, and this can cause some serious respiratory illnesses."
Efforts by The Sunday Gleaner to get a response from the National Environment and Planning Agency (NEPA) regarding the pollution were unsuccessful. However, according to Mr. Rowe, the majority of residents who seek medical attention at the Foundation's clinic, had been treated mainly for sinus problems and the common cold.
