Unstable land causes anxiety for seniors in crumbling house

As Jamaica was placed under tropical storm watch earlier this week, elderly couple Basil and Mavis Solomon stood in their crack-riddled house in Zion Hill, St Mary, praying and hoping that it would not slide away if pelted by heavy rains and winds.

The pensioners say that about a decade ago, they started seeing small cracks in the walls of the house, and as time passed, they discovered that the cause was a landslip slowly occurring on their property based on the Barracks River Road’s breakaway.

In October 2009, the National Works Agency (NWA) ordered the Barracks River main road closed to vehicular traffic as a result of that breakaway.

Back then, the condition of the road worsened as a result of heavy rains over two days.

“The land, all the way down to the road, has been pulling to that side, and the house is going with it, so the cracks are in the direction of the path the land is going,” Basil, a 70-year-old retiree, told The Gleaner on Tuesday as the island was experiencing rains and winds associated with Tropical Storm Lisa as it passed south of the island.

“After my mother died, I noticed some baby cracks coming up, but we were watching it, and over the years, it started to get wider and wider and when we take a stock and look outside, there’s a little retaining wall around there [the back of the house] where you can see the wall had start to move away and the land starts to drop,” Basil said.

The house was originally owned by Basil’s now-deceased mother, but he and his wife moved in to live with her after she had a stroke 17 years ago.

The couple met 20 years ago at Teen Challenge Jamaica in Ocho Rios, St Ann, which Basil attended for healing and to rid himself of alcoholic habits, and where Mavis was employed. They later got married in 2005.

For her part, 62-year-old Mavis said she first realised the house was being pulled away when the grille at the back door started slowly shifting farther each day.

“Each time the rain falls, it gets worse and worse because it just keeps going, going, going, and we just watch it and hoping that we will get some help,” Mavis said.

Now, around a decade later, even though the couple had plans to buy cement and seal the cracks, a contractor told them that the cracks would eventually reopen as the land continues to shift.

The couple said that a section of the land affected by the landslide is owned by the Zion Hill Primary School, which is below their house. They have been told that a potential solution to prevent the continuous landslide is to build a new retaining wall alongside the school’s perimeter.

To date, they have not been able to pay for the construction of the wall because Mavis was laid off during the pandemic and Basil’s meagre pension of $8,500 monthly is insufficient.

“We earn wi money by prayer. We just pray and people give us, and so on,” Mavis told The Gleaner with a humble smile.

At one point, the duo raised chicken layers to sell eggs, but they said that that business was not successful.

Basil told The Gleaner that they sometimes got a monthly electricity bill of $13,000, which the pension could not cover.

“We have to get food, and so on, but we have to live until the Lord answers. We live by faith, and we always have somebody giving something to us,” he said.

“We don’t work, so we are hoping that we could get some help,” Mavis added.

Pre-pandemic, Basil said he approached their member of parliament, Dr Morais Guy, to render them some assistance, but he believes that Guy has not returned with a positive response because of the onset of the pandemic and its impact on the economy.

Nonetheless, the couple is remaining hopeful and is seeking assistance from the public to build a retaining wall and repair their home.

Persons interested in offering assistance may call them at 876-891-5217.

ainsworth.morris@gleanerjm.com