There is growing realisation that the culture and practice of public housing provision needs to change. 30 years into democracy, it is abundantly clear that the state is unable to provide housing at the scale and pace required. Instead, the state should direct its capabilities and resources towards enabling self-build at scale, while prioritising the housing needs (and rights) of key vulnerable groups through specific housing programmes. The Draft White Paper for Human Settlements acknowledges and affirms this position yet falls short in addressing its full implications. Particularly lacking is a concrete proposal for a support programme enabling self-build housing construction at scale. Without adequate financial and technical assistance, individuals will persist in constructing dwellings within their means, perpetuating the status quo of unsafe and undignified living conditions.

The scaling-up of serviced site provision by the state must therefore include enablement and support for incremental self-build housing construction, focussed on both state financial support and technical support via a Housing Support Centre (HSC) model. The institutionalisation of Housing Support Centres coupled to a public funding mechanism to enable self-build by poor households are key dimensions of an appropriate support programme, which, following the national elections on 29 May, the next administration should incorporate into future human settlements policy and programming.

In 2023, Isandla Institute and the Development Action Group (DAG), partners in the Backyard Matters (BYM) project focused on backyard housing since 2019, identified the need to pilot the HSC model in the context of backyard housing with a ‘willing municipality’. The purpose of the pilot is to test the HSC model, demonstrate its benefits and determine how it can be replicated and augmented; and to support policy advocacy around uptake of the model in local, provincial and national policy and programmes. Via a competitive process, the Project chose the City of Cape Town as the preferred partner for the pilot. Key principles of the pilot include: community involvement in the scope and monitoring of the pilot, thereby promoting accountability and potential for improved relationship with the targeted community; include a neighbourhood focus, beyond focusing on individuals/households; and, promote transversal municipal working practices towards providing a more integrated, 'customer-centric' and efficient area-based service in terms of housing support and other municipal service needs, thereby strengthening communication and improving community trust in the municipality.

The 6-month pilot, named “The Right to Build Initiative”, will run from June to November 2024, with a documentation and evaluation phase leading up to March 2025. The pilot will also serve to inform the City’s roll-out of their planned Local Planning Support Office (LPSO) programme, which is contained in the City’s Human Settlements Strategy and IDP, as well as forming part of a Mayoral Priority Programme on affordable housing. The pilot will run in 2 areas of Cape Town: Langa and Palm Park in Eerste River, focussing on assisting people with information and advice on housing-related issues and services. The primary target are homeowners in the pilot areas (many of whom will be landlords), while the secondary target are the backyard tenants in these areas.

The pilot will consist of monthly information sessions on topical housing-related issues, followed by a Saturday “advice clinic” (also once a month), where community members will be able to get advice from City staff on any of the issues that are covered by the Right to Build Initiative. These issues include: the rights and responsibilities of homeowners and tenants (e.g. title deeds, lease agreements, how to resolve landlord-tenant conflicts); understanding City processes (e.g. City application processes, property taxation, and compliance); understanding City services (e.g. free basic services, how to apply for or report issues with basic services); and property regularisation, development and improvement (e.g. regularisation of existing structures, prototypical plans, urban design guidelines, and development charges and administrative fee reductions). To ensure more consistent and accessible support on building-related issues, City staff will be in the two pilot neighbourhoods on a weekly basis.

As part of the Right to Build Initiative, community leadership structures in the pilot areas will be involved in monitoring and giving feedback on the initiative in monthly meetings with DAG and Isandla Institute. Attendees of any of the Right to Build Initiative events will have an opportunity to give feedback on the information and services received. Furthermore, the focus on neighbourhood-level issues and concerns will also be taken forward in the monthly engagements with community leadership.

The lessons learnt from this HSC pilot will be shared with other municipalities through peer-learning events and will also be documented and disseminated to key stakeholders in national and provincial government, civil society, the private sector and academia. As the Right to Build Initiative has a very specific scope, more testing and refinement of the HSC model is needed in other cities and other human settlement contexts (e.g. informal settlements). This will serve to build a strong evidence base and advocacy platform for the institutionalisation of the HSC model in human settlements policy and programming. By creating an enabling and supportive environment for incremental self-build housing construction, and thereby supporting the right of people to build their own housing, the state can move from its former primary delivery role to one of enablement and, most importantly, improved housing outcomes can be achieved.