Introduction
The history of Puerto Rico as a U.S territory is steeped in the violence of colonisation, resulting in a political landscape dependent on the desires of foreign stakeholders (Grosfoguel, 2003). This has led to a severe decline in the standard of living for Puerto Ricans residents, where their economy and welfare are risked for the economic gains of the US mainland (Backiel, 2015). For instance, the influx of abandoned buildings in Puerto Rico is one of the many consequences of this lasting colonial framework, as marginalised communities are not receiving the necessary aid for their rehabilitation (Hinojosa and Meléndez, 2018). This community briefing will explore how the abandoned building crisis manifests specifically in the municipality of Loíza and give recommendations to residents on what they should advocate for to rebuild their community. Prior to discussing my recommendations for this issue, this community briefly will first give context to the issue by discussing the colonial history of Puerto Rico on a macro scale, then focus on the community of Loíza and the multiple facets of this presented challenge.
Colonialism in Puerto Rico
Puerto Rico is an island understood as an unincorporated territory of the United States, a status often exploited by an ongoing colonial agenda. Puerto Ricans are US citizens yet lack the political representation in the US government constitutional to those in the US mainland, where decisions by congress are made without official votes from Puerto Rican elected representatives (Derieux, 2010). This has led to severe limitations on resources like federal tax provisions and welfare programs, thus ostracising Puerto Rico and their socio-political struggles (Derieux, 2010, pg. 800). The colonial legacy in Puerto Rico begins during its acquisition by Spain when the Taíno natives were enslaved and massacred in the early 1500s, followed by America’s seizing of the land after the Spanish-American war (Malavet, 2000). This history of exploitation demands for current socio-political issues like inadequate housing to be examined on an extended temporal scale, allowing for a recognition of these issues relative to colonialism and a weaponised dependence on the United States.
Pharmaceuticals and manufacturing industries were the leading drivers of growth in Puerto Rico in the mid-twentieth century (Corser, 2022). These US Companies were attracted to the island’s generous tax incentives to foreign investors, such as section 936 of the Income Tax Act of 2007, which creates exemptions from corporate income tax on profits generated in Puerto Rico (Feliciano, 2018). Unfortunately, this prompted a lack of investment in local businesses and self-realised infrastructure, allowing for the large US corporations to gain market dominance (Corser, 2022). When the tax breaks and incentives were suddenly withheld by the US government in 1996, it led to sudden deindustrialisation as the industries moved out of Puerto Rico, inducing severe urban decay (Corser, 2022). This was made drastically worse by the tragedy of Hurricane Maria in 2017, beyond the tragic death of thousands of residents, crucial infrastructure used to deliver goods and services was devastated, forcing a waiting game on when or if supplies would be delivered from the US mainland (Meléndez and Venator-Santiago, 2018). Without US corporations and support, Puerto Rico was forced to deepen their debt at the cost of their own community and take austerity measures in infrastructure, housing, and other key facets of growth (Newkirk, 2018).
Larger powers like the US mainland are continuing to fail in giving space to marginalised voices with the purpose of knowingly pursuing their own gain. This catered support for non-residents and rapid urban decay is leading to mass outmigration, significantly contributing to the current abandoned building crisis (Hinojosa, 2018).
Positionality
In regard to my present claim of prioritising the voices of Puerto Ricans, I feel it is crucial to address my own positionality within the issue, noting my own strengths and weaknesses for writing this report. My family are current residents of San Juan, Puerto Rico, where half of my lineage can be traced back to. However, most of my life has been spent in the US mainland, and I have limited experience with the consequences of neocolonialism and the racialised infrastructure I will be discussing in this briefing. However, I have spent time acting as a volunteer marketing coordinator for the non-profit Casa Taft 169, a non-profit working towards the sustainable transformation of abandoned buildings, bringing my attention to often-obscured issues like anti-Blackness in infrastructure (Moscoso, 2023). My work here has allowed me to develop a more acute understanding of the obstacles one must face in pursuing the sustainable and equitable transformation of a community in Puerto Rico.
Additionally, I recognise how I myself have benefited from the colonial land relations as a person who has moved from the mainland to the island, but in this report, I hope to shed light on these persisting colonial structures, rather than participate in their concealment.
The Community
As previously stated, this report will focus on Loíza, a community described as an Afro-Caribbean enclave on the northeastern coast of the island. After hurricane Maria, the area was decimated and the recovery was slow, as represented by the federally distributed blue tarps meant to cover damaged roofs for 30 days remaining for many years after the tragedy (Garcia, 2019). Loíza has a high concentration of abandoned buildings, slowly deteriorating due to a lack of safeguards for environmental hazards and policies to rebuild the area (Pérez, 2002). However, this vulnerable position did not begin with the events of hurricane Maria, instead it can be traced back to the area’s history as a settlement for people who have escaped enslavement.
In the nineteenth century, Loíza became a haven for people freed from or having escaped enslavement, as the abundant mangrove systems helped conceal this area from intruders (Declet-Barreto, 2022). The natural seclusion of this area in Puerto Rico helped foster this unique cultural enclave, where many African traditions manifested through music, food, dance, and other localised activities. However, Loíza became a community that was treated through a veil of ‘otherness,’ where there is a severe lack of investment in its socio-economic development due to the community being physically separated from other municipalities (Hiraldo, 2006). Until recently, there was only one road connecting Loíza to other parts of the archipelago, and this spatial distancing has inhibited the understanding of African culture in Puerto Rican heritage as one with the constructed national identity (Hiraldo, 2006, pg. 67). The racism and social exclusion embedded in Loíza’s infrastructure led to a slow rate of industrialisation which can be witnessed through the lack of hospitals and other crucial forms of infrastructure in Loíza (García and Hernandez, 2023).
The recognition of structural racism in Puerto Rico is crucial when examining the abandoned building crisis in Loíza. These structures manifest on both the local and federal level, as on a local scale, afro descendant communities like Loíza are, as previously stated, subjected to a slow rate of industrialisation and other unjust concentrations of austerity measures. However, this manifestation of racialised infrastructure demonstrates how anti-blackness is not a byproduct of capitalist and colonialist societies, but rather a prerequisite (Bledsoe and Wright, 2019). This racialised hierarchy in Puerto Rico is what allows certain areas to prosper at the expense of others through the “systematic negation of black spatial agency” (Bledsoe and Wright, 2019, pg. 26). This spatial marginalisation can additionally cause federal agencies to fail in providing monetary aid on an equitable level, compounding the vulnerabilities of such Afro-Caribbean communities.
As an example, the amount of aid distributed by organisations like the Federal Emergency Management Agency, FEMA, have been cited as unreflective of the community’s damage, as many Afro-Caribbean communities received far less funds than what was needed (Lloréns, 2021). The lack of necessary aid for Loíza after the hurricane is correlated to the influx of abandoned buildings as many households and schools were forced to be evacuated due to their hazardous conditions (Gomez, 2020). Additionally, this concentration of abandoned buildings has invited higher crime rates, as these abandoned sites became a popular site for drug exchanges and other illicit activities, due to the lack of supervision in these locations. (Jacobs et al., 2018). This contributed to the conceptualisation of Loíza as an abandoned site, creating determents for investments in the community.
The Challenge
In this section I will address how various sociopolitical factors like gentrification, property rights, and vulnerable infrastructure are impacting the abandoned building crisis in Loíza. By examining these external factors, I can take a systems approach in my recommendations and focus on sustaining the overall welfare of Loíza’s community while addressing the wickedness of the issue.
Tax incentives in Puerto Rico are meant to encourage foreign investors to buy local property to ultimately circulate more funds in the regional economy. However, this influx of affluent investors has allowed prices to rise in the housing market, making it unsustainable for the locals to afford the cost of living in Puerto Rico’s rapidly changing economic landscape (Arrojado, 2022). This can create further obstacles for low-income residents to secure housing in urban areas, as these gentrified spaces can exclude marginalised groups like Afro-Carribean communities. Consequently, these marginalised residents are then pushed to areas in which lack federal investment like Loíza (Machicote, 2016, pg. 28). This then exasperates a feedback loop of people leaving the island because of the inaccessibility to resources and the lack of outlets to work towards rebuilding the community according to local needs. Thus, homes are continuing to become vacant, and Puerto Ricans continue to be displaced.
FEMA formally recognises Loíza as a flood zone, where residents have increased exposure to coastal erosion and other natural hazards (García and Hernandez, 2023). Furthermore, the primary form of housing in Loíza are informal settlements outside of government regulation, leading to inappropriate land use and worsening conditions for flooding (García and Hernandez, 2023). This leads to coastal dunes and mangroves in Loíza being damaged from unprofessional constructions and the foot-traffic from unregulated beach access, inhibiting the natural environmental service of flood regulation (García and Hernandez, 2023). Homes which do not adhere to regulatory building codes often lead to issues like overcrowding or inadequate water sanitation, thus risking the health and safety of residents (Malik, et al., 2020). This serves as a crucial reminder that to ensure the welfare of Loíza residents, abandoned buildings must be rehabilitated according to governmental regulations and be officially incorporated in governmental databases.
The reason for this disproportionate amount of informal housing can again be traced back to when Puerto Rico was under Spanish colonial rule. As stated, Loíza became an area concentrated with people who escaped enslavement due to a colonial decree (Garcia, 2019). Many families currently living in Loíza gained their property rights via this decree, and this land was then passed down generationally (Garcia, 2019). This type of property ownership differs from the wider Puerto Rican community, causing many residents of Loíza to not have formal titles to their land (Garcia, 2019). Additionally, without this proof of ownership many residents were unable to receive benefits like federal aid after Hurricane Maria as they were excluded from the provision of public services (Garcia, 2019). These lasting colonial structures make residents vulnerable and create unnecessary divisions between Loíza and the government.
Recommendations
From the context previously given, this abandoned building crisis requires collaboration between the public and third sector. With this approach, grassroots organisations and non-profits can cooperate with government agencies to ensure that rehabilitation programs are regulated to protect the health and welfare of Loíza residents. However, this briefing will maintain the prioritisation of a bottom-up approach to the crisis where the needs of the residents are regarded as paramount. The recommendations included in this community briefing will focus on creating a system for participatory urban design while enforcing regulations opposing the ongoing colonial agenda.
Civic Centre for Receiving Input from Loíza Residents
The first step in creating a system for participatory urban design is setting up formalised outlets for Loíza residents to voice their concerns and desires for their community. Through outlets like civic centres, it will be easier to decide how abandoned buildings should be transformed to best suit the needs of the community. The ability and right to transform abandoned buildings has already been secured by the non-profit Casa Taft 169, as their lobbying efforts resulted in the creation of Act 157, amending Puerto Rico’s 1930 Civil Code (Bernal, 2022). Through this act, nuisance properties can be assigned by the municipal government to be sold or rented to non-profit organisations, rather than having no formalised pathway to rehabilitate nuisance buildings. Casa Taft 169 has already used this opportunity to create civic centres out of abandoned buildings, where the community can gather to give their input into how they can redevelop their neighbourhood using sustainable infrastructure (Moscoso, 2017). This initiative has already proven successful in Machuchal, Puerto Rico, where Casa Taft 169 established the first self-run civic centre in Puerto Rico through the transformation of an abandoned building (Moscoso, 2017). This became a catalyst for the city’s sustainable transformation through enthusiastic and sustained civic engagement. By having a space like this in Loíza, most likely from one of the abandoned buildings already present, there will be a greater capacity for residents to speak to each other about the issues they are facing and to consider if the proposed changes risks further displacement for the community. These concerns can then be transcribed and used as qualitative data to be used as a crucial point of reference for the government and involved non-profits.
“Casa Taft 169 aims to set a different standard by demonstrating that public nuisance houses are not exclusively disposable, but instead offering great opportunities for the sustainable reimagining and redesigning of spaces” (Bernal, 2022, pg.1) To redesign spaces, Casa Taft 169 has formed a partnership with La Maraña, an organisation dedicated to participatory urban design in Puerto Rico, and as stated on their website, “to facilitate the insertion of communities in the decision-making, design and creation processes of the spaces they inhabit” (La Maraña , 2023). This is done by using the qualitative data gathered from residents, as can be achieved through the implementation of civic centres, and transforming it into construction documents. Through this initiative, the imagination of residents can be realised while being grounded in current housing laws and regulations. Moreover, it is my recommendation and hope that La Maraña collaborates with local artists and professionals in the facilitation of these constructions, as it will encourage long-term and creative engagement with the community’s redevelopment.
Through this partnership with Casa Taft 169 and La Maraña, there will also be an opportunity to address the community’s vulnerabilities to coastal erosion and flooding. Casa Taft 169 has previously hosted workshops to educate on sustainable home repair, and this was done by getting the community involved in the physical reconstruction of the deteriorating sites. While Casa Taft 169 was being rebuilt into a civic centre the neighbourhood was invited to learn how the renewable energy systems were installed, ways to use recycled building materials, the installation process of the water harvesting systems, and much more (Moscoso, 2023). Through this initiative, abandoned buildings can also become a place for education, allowing the community of Loíza to learn how to create stronger infrastructure as a vulnerable flood zone.
Official Inventory for Abandoned Buildings
Currently, the Puerto Rican government relies on citizens to identify, and report abandoned buildings, as the public nuisance procedures in place are ineffective due to the excessive administration and high costs associated with it (García and Gallardo, 2021). Yet, self-reporting remains a long and overly bureaucratic process, often leading to people abandoning this pursuit according to anonymous Puerto Rican lawyers (García and Gallardo, 2021, pg. 69). This bureaucratic red tape is also associated with the slow provision of aid after hurricane Maria, especially in Loíza where many do not have formal titles to their land. This creates an inaccurate picture of the issue’s scale and allows for the further deterioration of buildings which can go beyond the reasonable capacity for repair. For instance, the “Inventory of Properties Declared as Public Nuisances” created in 2016 to address the inaction from the government in the abandoned property crisis, only reported 106 properties out of what is believed to be more than 40,000 (García and Gallardo, 2021, pg.64). It can be assumed that the government’s inefficiency in addressing this problem is made worse in Loíza, due to the isolated and informal nature of the housing in the municipality. The lack of awareness and recognition of the issue’s scale and the unique barrier in gaining titles to properties in Loíza exasperates the crisis, thus demanding full cooperation from the government in creating an efficient plan of action. To break this punitive cycle of Loíza being subjected to the slow provision of aid, a partnership between the Puerto Rican government and relevant NGOs could help streamline the process to create a reliable inventory of vacant properties.
Due to this prioritisation of efficiency and speed in creating this updated property inventory, I am recommending partnerships with NGOs who have access to advanced mapping technologies. As a point of reference, the city of Baltimore in Maryland addressed their vacant building crisis through their Vacants to Value program, which used GIS technology to compile market data on housing demands with a vacant housing inventory updated monthly using various mapping resources (Kvit et al., 2022). This created a visual which private developers could refer to, thus driving up incentives for involved stakeholders to take action in allocating abandoned properties (Kvit et al., 2022). Regarding Loíza, I recommend that the community contact NGOs with access to GIS technology, such as Direct Relief, a humanitarian aid organisation who provides help using their extensive mapping technologies and request a governmental collaboration with them (Hensmans et al., 2023). Additionally, Direct Relief already has a relationship with Puerto Rico through the aid they provided after many natural disaster crises, allowing for a greater capacity to build this relationship further (Hensmans et al., 2023).
Community Driven Home Repair
The afterlife of colonialism has left Loíza in a continuous state of disrepair, and to resolve this proliferation of abandonment there needs to be an intensive repair program. As already stated, Loíza is made up of informal housing in environmentally hazardous areas and this has led to homes to be extensively damaged to the point where they are inhospitable for people to continue to live in. There is already a Hazard Mitigation Planning Process being put in place in Loíza, however this initiative maintains a focus on implementing preventative infrastructure rather than rebuilding what is already damaged (PR.gov, 2021).
I recommend the implementation of funding programs which support the home repair costs of residents, rather than depending on external bodies to repair the issue. This will build up the autonomy of the Loíza community in creating unique and sustainable infrastructure as seen in the Casa Taft 169 initiative. In addition, I want to emphasise a focus on creating programs specifically for Loíza’s senior population. There is a housing disparity for senior citizens in Puerto Rico, as many are struggling to afford Puerto Rico’s rapidly changing economy in their retirement (García and Rúa, 2018). Homes owned by the elderly can also be a significant cause of the proliferation of vacant housing, as once the owner of the property has passed, it can be difficult to find relatives to pursue the rehabilitation of the building. My recommended senior home repair program will be founded on building relationships with Loíza’s elderly population, where participants can help rebuild their homes sustainably and the elderly can communicate their concerns about land inheritance.
Community participation programs as I am suggesting are said to be effective in building the strength of a community through the relationships it builds within a neighbourhood. This can create more channels for communication when addressing the abandoned building crisis and act as a preventative measure for unaccounted-for vacant buildings (Osterkamp, et al., 1995). However, there are studies which doubt the effectiveness of community participation programmes, as communities are often not homogenous and want to address the issue in contrasting ways (Rifkin, 1986). Yet, I believe by opening these avenues for people to share skills and resources, there will be a growing social consciousness in favour of helping vulnerable populations in Loíza.
Conclusion
This community briefing of Loíza has outlined how the colonial history of Puerto Rico has led to the ostracization of the Loíza community, leading to the spread of crumbling infrastructure and abandoned buildings. Through a discussion of Loíza as a community and its history, the abandoned building crisis could be understood as a wicked issue connected to other systems of oppression. In closing, my recommendation in addressing this issue requests for Loíza residents to advocate for a formal assessment of the crisis’s scale and to collaborate with various participatory non-profits to rebuild their community according to their own visions.
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