GOOD press statement by Brett Herron,
GOOD: Secretary-General & Member of Parliament
26 May 2022
The GOOD Party is encouraged by the City of Cape Town’s about turn on the development of affordable housing on well-located parcels of publicly-owned land in the inner-city.
The City’s hitherto resistance to unstitching the apartheid Group Areas Act was morally indefensible and unsustainable.
Today it announced a call for proposals to develop two such land parcels, in Newmarket Street, in the City Centre, and in Pickwick Street in Salt River – four years after strongly resisting the very idea.
The two sites were among five identified for mixed-use and mixed-income development by the administration of former Mayor Patricia De Lille in 2017. The City’s DA caucus vehemently resisted the developments, which led to De Lille and my resigning from the City.
Although the five sites had attracted 13 affordable housing development proposals from the private sector, the DA scrapped the initiative lock, stock and barrel soon after De Lille and I departed.
Advocating for the reinstatement of these development plans was a central pillar of GOOD’s local government election campaign last year
The two sites that are back on the table will produce 760 affordable homes in mixed income developments, the City now says. That’s regrettably 140 less affordable homes than originally planned. But it is nonetheless a start.
We welcome the development of public land for public good. We are pleased that the City has come to its senses by recognising the long-term value of developing mixed-use and mixed-income developments with a threshold of a minimum number of social housing units.
It is exactly the formula we proposed five years ago.
Now, we call on the City to have the courage of its convictions and develop the other sites identified in 2017 and 2018. These include other City Centre land as well as sites in Green Point, Parow, Claremont and Wynberg.
Media enquiries:
Brett Herron, GOOD: Secretary-General & Member of Parliament
Cell: 0825183264
Email: bretth@forgood.org.za
Samkelo Mgobozi, GOOD: Media Manager
Cell: 0792315977 (whatsapp)/0829684021 (calls)
Email: samm@forgood.org.za