Housing quota go ahead
Apparently exclusive neighbourhoods are too exclusive. The regime is concocting a scheme to impose racial quotas on housing developments.
Negotiations are under way with developers to establish quotas in residential developments so that each area is made up of families of differing income levels, according to housing minister Lindiwe Sisulu.
At the conference of the Southern African Housing Foundation yesterday, Sisulu told delegates that the new quota system, a "much misunderstood strategy", was aimed at removing apartheid in residential areas. "We as the government need to ensure residential developments take into account that we can no longer live apart and therefore we have to begin to manage this integration."
She pointed out that the government had entered into "social contracts" with financial services providers and had negotiated with them to provide R42 billion to people in the affordable housing sector.
She said the biggest challenge was the insufficient housing stock for this target bracket. To overcome the problem she had adopted a two-pronged approach, providing well-located land to encourage the private sector to cater for this market and ensuring that part of the R42 billion would also be used as bridging finance for developers.
The minister also insisted that the "inclusionary" process was not prescriptive, but supported a range of options. These had yet to be defined "as we negotiate with the developers".
Odette Crofton from the Social Housing Foundation urged the minister not to impose quotas this year. "The private sector is approaching us. They want to do this, but they want to do it organically, in response to demand and need in particular areas."
Marie Huchzermeyer from the University of the Witwatersrand's school of architecture and planning said that imposing quotas in the northern suburbs of Johannesburg might not work.
She warned that where it had worked, in the US, care had to be taken to preserve the mixed nature of the development. "After some years the income gap narrows and the units get sold off into the market." She also wanted to see subsidies and tax relief linked to a preservation system.
Democratic Alliance housing spokesperson Butch Steyn said there were problems with the system. The party "is in favour of integrated housing, but the minister is speaking of imposing a 20 percent quota of all new housing developments to be set aside for low-cost housing. This simply won't work where you are building a cluster of R4 million or R5 million houses," he said. "We must approach this very circumspectly." Read more
Negotiations are under way with developers to establish quotas in residential developments so that each area is made up of families of differing income levels, according to housing minister Lindiwe Sisulu.
At the conference of the Southern African Housing Foundation yesterday, Sisulu told delegates that the new quota system, a "much misunderstood strategy", was aimed at removing apartheid in residential areas. "We as the government need to ensure residential developments take into account that we can no longer live apart and therefore we have to begin to manage this integration."
She pointed out that the government had entered into "social contracts" with financial services providers and had negotiated with them to provide R42 billion to people in the affordable housing sector.
She said the biggest challenge was the insufficient housing stock for this target bracket. To overcome the problem she had adopted a two-pronged approach, providing well-located land to encourage the private sector to cater for this market and ensuring that part of the R42 billion would also be used as bridging finance for developers.
The minister also insisted that the "inclusionary" process was not prescriptive, but supported a range of options. These had yet to be defined "as we negotiate with the developers".
Odette Crofton from the Social Housing Foundation urged the minister not to impose quotas this year. "The private sector is approaching us. They want to do this, but they want to do it organically, in response to demand and need in particular areas."
Marie Huchzermeyer from the University of the Witwatersrand's school of architecture and planning said that imposing quotas in the northern suburbs of Johannesburg might not work.
She warned that where it had worked, in the US, care had to be taken to preserve the mixed nature of the development. "After some years the income gap narrows and the units get sold off into the market." She also wanted to see subsidies and tax relief linked to a preservation system.
Democratic Alliance housing spokesperson Butch Steyn said there were problems with the system. The party "is in favour of integrated housing, but the minister is speaking of imposing a 20 percent quota of all new housing developments to be set aside for low-cost housing. This simply won't work where you are building a cluster of R4 million or R5 million houses," he said. "We must approach this very circumspectly." Read more
posted by Jopie Fourie at 2:49 AM
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Wat de fok gaan in die land aan ?
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