A?woman?who bought property from the National Housing Corporation (NHC) in 1999 to build her dream home has had to put her plans on pause because of a metal dump that has been developed right next door to her land.
The upset woman, who has complained on numerous occasions to the operator of the dump, as well as to the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of the Environment, said she had now reached the point where she was considering selling the land because nothing had been done by the authorities to uphold the covenant while the dump kept getting bigger and bigger.
The land is located at Frank Avenue, Odle Glen, St George, and is a relatively new middle class neighbourhood.
Operator of the dump, Phillip Greaves, admitted that he had been visited by inspectors at the Ministry of the Environment, adding that he was trying to clear the land of the old metal “bit by bit”.
But this has given the woman, who resides outside of Barbados, no comfort, since it has virtually derailed her plans of building a home for her family.
The woman, who did not want to be identified, said when she bought the land, the metal dump was not there.
“I left Barbados in 2009 and when I returned the next year I started seeing signs of old metal and trucks being parked on my land. My dad spoke to the owner and told him to remove the trucks. Since then, every year that I come back home there is more and more metal. I was just appalled.”
Pointing out that the covenant listed the area as strictly residential and forbade residents from even erecting galvanized sheets as a fence, the 42-year-old woman said she and her aunt, who also bought the plot next to hers, visited the NHC to discuss the matter.
“We met with an official and he explained that because the land was sold, the situation was out of their hands and he advised us to go to the Ministry of the Environment.”
The woman said she filed complaints with both the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Environment.
“I invested my money in what I thought was a nice neighbourhood. To have that dump next door to my property would devalue my property. I?am thinking about selling it but if I was looking for land I would never buy a lot which is right next door to a dump,” she cried.
She recalled that on one occasion the Ministry of Health had written landowners in the area about clearing their land of grass and she and her aunt promptly spent $1 700 to have their land cleared.
“Why is it that we respected the authorities and debushed our land, but this man is breaching the covenant and nobody does anything about it?” she asked.
Greaves, who said he moved to the area in 1989, pointed out that the trucks and metal were his livelihood.
“This may seem like junk to them but I?just get $1500 for selling the front cab of a truck,” he stated, as he pulled a wad of bills from his pocket.
He said inspectors from the Ministry of Health had visited him about clearing the land and he had given them the assurance that he would.
“A man came out here and he was a bit ticked off that I had parked my trucks on his land and I?moved them. I already start to clean the land by getting rid of the metal but this is what I depend on for money,” he said.
