House collapses, three children injured
The CuBel houses may be going up, but the old wooden houses in Belize City keep on coming down. Today another house, this time on Frederick Alley, came crashing down. And just like the last one on Cemetery Road in July, the occupants were inside at the time. Three children were injured and the entire family is still trying to recover from the shock. Now they don’t know what to do, or who to turn to for help.
Lavern Gladden had just made lunch and was about to serve the family when she was alerted by her boyfriend and told to quickly get out of the house.
Lavern Gladden, Resident
“”Lavern, Lavern hurry come out of the house, hurry come out of the house.” When he done holler that, the house was coming down with we inside of it, so we could not do anything.”
At the time Gladden was holding her three-month-old son. The mother said as the house fell the baby was thrown out of her arms.
Lavern Gladden
“And he just fly one side out of my hands. Three months old! They took him to the hospital.”
The baby and two other children knocked their heads as the building crashed on the ground. Fortunately none of the injuries are considered serious. The four-bedroom house, however, was totally demolished. The family did manage to save most of their household belongings. It is believed the house fell simply because it was extremely old and dilapidated. Gladden says for sometime now she has been trying to get assistance from the Ministry of Housing but to no avail. Prior to the incident, Gladden says the house was leaning and she had informed Dickie Bradley, Minister of Housing about the situation.
Lavern Gladden
“They made me fill out the form; I filled out the form already and I no get no reply. But it’s up and down, up and down every minute all the time. Sometime I go late but I did see him and he said he would help me but I had to fill out the form and I did fill out the form. They come check the place already cause they already saw the place and I no get no reply after that.”
Minister Dickie Bradley told News Five the Ministry of Housing can only provide shelter to those families who are looking to build on land that belongs to them. He says he will be looking into this case, however, to see what kind of assistance can be given. But for now Bradley says the family should seek assistance from the Department of Social Services.
Dickie Bradley, Minister of Housing
“Their immediate need is to quickly access the trained personnel on Church Street who will be able to find temporary shelter for them, assist with clothing and try to get them to put up back their lives temporarily. And how the officials at the Ministry of Housing would come in is, if that land belongs to them or they have another land for them, we can readily see how we can work out something with the Ministry of Finance for temporary shelter.”
Q: “What will the family do now?”
Lavern Gladden
“I no know. I no know cause I no have no way to go. So I no know what I will do. We no have no way to go. That is why we were here. We were on our own… I no know.”
Gladden says the house and the land belong to a relative and she does not believe she will be able to build on the property. In the meantime Gladden says she hopes someone will come to their rescue.
