JDF and ODPEM to get fresh building supplies from $1.4b hurricane relief fund

The Jamaica Defence Force and the Office of Disaster Preparedness and Emergency Management are set to benefit from $1.4 billion in donated hurricane-recovery funds, with building materials to be bought after stocks ran low during repairs linked to Hurricane Melissa.

Prime Minister Dr Andrew Holness outlined the plan while visiting Lewis Town Early Childhood Institution in Brompton, St Elizabeth, on Labour Day. He said donated construction supplies used in communities damaged by the hurricane are now close to finished.

“We are going to restock the JDF and ODPEM with building materials, we have the funds to do it now, so that you [the JDF and ODPEM] can go on to do another 500 roofs,” Holness said.

The prime minister also pushed back against criticism of how the administration managed the money. He said the government did not hurry to spend the donations immediately after the hurricane because Jamaica was already receiving significant humanitarian support at the time.

“We want to be able to say to those people who have contributed, Jamaica has put on 1,000 roofs, this is the material, this is what you have spent on,” he said. “That’s something that you can see… tangible, accountable, traceable.”

Holness rejected claims that the auditor-general had found wrongdoing involving relief items.

“It didn’t say the materials were stolen, but there was an administrative accounting failure,” he said.

He said the concern was mainly caused by the way supplies were delivered and received. In several cases, trucks reached the delivery point late at night, after ODPEM staff had ended their workday, so JDF personnel were the only ones available to sign for the goods.

“The JDF operates 24 hours. ODPEM operates nine to five. The truckers are carrying in the material when there is less traffic and congestion, so by the time they reach here when people are gone, only JDF is here to sign,” Holness said.

Some of the donation money is also earmarked for the government’s modular housing initiative. That includes a planned settlement in Westmoreland for people who remain in shelters seven months after the hurricane.

“We are building a small community in Westmoreland to facilitate those persons who were being housed at the Petersfield Shelter (Petersfield High School), we have the units here now,” he said.

Holness said the state has already obtained hundreds of modular homes through both procurement and overseas help.

“We made a promise of about 2,500 modular, semi-permanent prefabricated housing units through the NHT. The government of China has given us some, the Ministry of Housing has purchased some and I believe it’s the Red Cross that is giving us some as well, so we may get up to 3,000 modular units,” he said.

However, he said the units would not simply be placed on unsuitable land without preparation.

“I want you to think with me Jamaica, my government is not going to take the units and just come and pack them down anywhere, that wouldn’t help, we are not going to do that,” Holness said. “Whatever units we put down, they must be on a proper base because if you put them down on anything that is not firm and flat they will warp, defects and all of that, so we are going to have to build a proper base for them, a concrete base.”