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Inner city social housing – five years later

  • Council last week resolved to invite public comment for social housing on two large city-owned land parcels
  • The sites are part of 11 centrally located sites mooted for social housing in 2017
  • Move welcomed by housing advocates, despite slow progress

It has taken more than five years for the City of Cape Town to release two large portions of centrally located land for social housing. At the council meeting on Thursday 26 May, the commencement of a public participation process for more than 700 social housing units to be built on vacant city-owned land in Salt River and the foreshore was given the go-ahead.

In his speech before council, mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis announced the recently launched land release programme was a priority, and asked council to start the public participation process so these two parcels of land could be used for social housing.

The Salt River site on Pickwick Road, and the foreshore site on Newmarket Street are two of 11 city-owned parcels of land in or near the CBD which were identified for social housing by the Transport and Urban Development Authority (TDA) established under former mayor Patricia de Lille in 2017.

Only one of the 11 centrally located sites identified by the TDA, the transitional housing project on Pickwick Road abutting the approximatly three hectares of open land identified for social housing, has been developed. According to Ndifuna Ukwazi researcher Robyn Park-Ross, the transitional housing was built to accommodate 19 families who needed to be moved from Pine Road in Woodstock – another of the 11 identified sites – in order for the Pine Road site to move ahead.

Park-Ross said none of the other projects have broken ground. She said Ndifuna Ukwazi, a housing advocacy NGO, kept being told over the last year that the Pine Road social housing development would start. In council, Hill-Lewis said building plans for the Pine Road development were submitted by the developer on 20 May, with construction due to start in “a couple of months”.

Old plans in a new guise

The TDA, established in 2017 and headed by former mayco member for transport and urban settlements Brett Herron, was disbanded by former mayor Dan Plato when he took office in late 2019, after de Lille had been ousted from her position. It was a plan to dismantle Cape Town’s apartheid spatial planning by aligning various affordable housing initiatives with public transport corridors. Herron resigned soon after de Lille resigned as mayor and member of the DA under a cloud in 2018, and joined her when she established the GOOD party. Hill-Lewis appears to be moving forward with the TDA initiatives, but now housed within the human settlements department under mayco member Malusi Booi.

In a media statement after the council meeting, Booi said 1,800 housing units would be built on the Pickwick Street site, with 600 of them reserved for social housing. At the site along Newmarket Street, 165 social housing units would be built, along with a further 365 mixed market units.

A report before subcouncil 16 in 2020 indicates Growthpoint Properties are currently renting the Newmarket site as a parking lot for R91,000 per month.

According to the Social Housing Regulatory Authority, the state provides capital grant funding for development, and the City states they will provide the land at a discounted rate, as well as discount or waive standard development levies. The social housing company does not receive operation funding and has to ensure sustainability through rental income, with a portion of market value units subsidising the social housing units.

Booi said the City plans to establish more than 6,500 social housing units on 50 parcels of land across the city. Of these, 2,000 units would be situated in the central city area, with a further 2,500 units along the Voortrekker Road corridor and near important economic nodes.

Hill-Lewis said the City was prioritising the release of parcels of city-owned land for social housing, with construction of a 150 social housing units set to commence this year at a site in Dillon Lane, Woodstock.

He said the City will also push national government to release “huge pieces of unutilised state land in the city” for housing. He said the national government owns 77 times more unutilised land in the city than that owned by the City of Cape Town itself, such as Youngsfield, Wingfield, and Ysterplaat, all managed by the Department of Public Works or Department of Defense. The Western Cape government also owns parcels of unutilised land in the city, such as in Bothasig and the Tafelberg site in Sea Point, where Ndifuna Ukwazi are advocating for Premier Alan Winde to develop social housing.

Park-Ross said although there was nothing new in what the mayor had announced, Ndifuna Ukwazi welcomed any progress toward social housing developments on any of the 11 centrally located sites.

“We encourage and welcome small steps of progress, but we need to see delivery of houses on the ground,” she said.

Affordable housing mix needed

According to the City’s own human settlements policy document, there is an annual shortage of 27,000 houses in Cape Town, including private sector housing delivery, while 53% of annual housing development will be informal.

While some of the 11 centrally located sites had gone through rezoning, and some through environmental impact assessment process, such slow progress “can’t be acceptable in face of such an urgent and increasing crisis”, said park-Ross.

Additionally, she said there was concern that households qualifying for social housing which were on the earning spectrum might not be catered for, particularly as social housing companies had to ensure their own financial sustainability.

“A portion has to be delivered in the lower end of the income bracket,” she said, and the reality that there were also many households falling below the minimum R1,501 per month income bracket. To this end, the City also needed to look at other types of housing solutions to cater for the full range of household incomes and needs. For example, she said more transitional housing was needed for families who were evicted by private landlords, as has occurred with the gentrification of Woodstock.

Formalisation could also be given to occupiers, such as at the old Woodstock Hospital, now Cissie Gool House. She said security could be given to occupiers who were acting in the context of “extreme crisis”, rather than them being seen as a problem.

“We want to see support for community-led housing solutions, housing-first solutions for street people, and all (affordable housing) models existing in South Africa.”

While Hill-Lewis said the release of land for social housing was now a priority programme, Park-Ross said there were only two people in City administration mandated to deal with social housing solutions, which undermined this commitment.

Salt River Residents Association chairperson Warda Rahim reiterated that Hill-Lewis had announced anything new. “We’ve been told many years ago the land would be released for social housing,” said Rahim.

She said as most Salt River residents were not affluent, the progress was welcomed by the residents association, but other affordable housing models also needed to be implemented in the area.

A statement by social housing company Communicare indicates they are earmarked to develop the Pickwick Street site.

Communicare Chief Operating Officer Makhosi Kubheka said the company welcomed the City’s decision to develop social housing on prime property close to the city.

“This is a step in the right direction, despite the slow progress, to address the spacial inequality in our city,” stated Kubheka.

She said there were still several administrative and procedural hurdles to be resolved before Communicare could break ground on the property, but “we look forward to engaging with the City to resolve the outstanding issues to fast track the delivery of social housing”.

A collection of trash found on the approximately three hectare site on Pickwick Road, Salt River, which is being released by the City for social housing.
A collection of trash found on the approximately three hectare site on Pickwick Road, Salt River, which is being released by the City for social housing.
A collection of trash found on the approximately three hectare site on Pickwick Road, Salt River, which is being released by the City for social housing.
A collection of trash found on the approximately three hectare site on Pickwick Road, Salt River, which is being released by the City for social housing.