Water, security and housing headline $4b PSIP

Im­prov­ing wa­ter sup­plies, strength­en­ing na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty and ex­pand­ing ac­cess to hous­ing are among the pri­or­i­ties in the Gov­ern­ment’s $4 bil­lion cap­i­tal spend­ing pro­gramme for fis­cal 2027.

The plans in­clude fund­ing for pro­duc­tion wells and wa­ter treat­ment fa­cil­i­ties aimed at im­prov­ing sup­ply, $471.2 mil­lion for se­cu­ri­ty-re­lat­ed projects, and mil­lions of dol­lars for hous­ing re­pairs and land dis­tri­b­u­tion.

The Na­tion­al Wa­ter Sec­tor En­hance­ment Pro­gramme has been al­lo­cat­ed $45 mil­lion for pro­duc­tion wells, with the aim of work­ing to­wards a base­line sup­ply of 24 hours a day, three days a week, na­tion­wide. A fur­ther $30 mil­lion is al­lo­cat­ed for wa­ter treat­ment fa­cil­i­ties in sev­er­al com­mu­ni­ties.

For na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty, the Trinidad and To­ba­go Po­lice Ser­vice is set to re­ceive $230.5 mil­lion, while $114 mil­lion is al­lo­cat­ed to the Coast Guard. Hous­ing ini­tia­tives in­clude $30 mil­lion for re­pairs to Hous­ing De­vel­op­ment Cor­po­ra­tion rental apart­ment blocks and $20 mil­lion for the Land for the Land­less pro­gramme.

The al­lo­ca­tions form part of a $3.9996 bil­lion Pub­lic Sec­tor In­vest­ment Pro­gramme (PSIP) cov­er­ing 1,272 projects in fis­cal 2027.

Wa­ter sup­ply a pri­or­i­ty

The wa­ter sec­tor al­lo­ca­tions in­clude $45 mil­lion for pro­duc­tion wells un­der the Na­tion­al Wa­ter Sec­tor En­hance­ment Pro­gramme, in­tend­ed to help es­tab­lish a base­line sup­ply of 24 hours a day, three days a week, na­tion­wide.

An­oth­er $30 mil­lion from an In­ter-Amer­i­can De­vel­op­ment Bank-fund­ed pro­gramme is ear­marked for treat­ment fa­cil­i­ties serv­ing San­ta Cruz, Golds­bor­ough, Gua­napo, Chatham, Freeport, Navet and North Oropouche.

The Ca­roni Wa­ter Treat­ment Plant, which serves about 500,000 peo­ple and pro­duces ap­prox­i­mate­ly 75 mil­lion gal­lons of wa­ter dai­ly, is al­lo­cat­ed $7.5 mil­lion for trav­el­ling bridges and sludge sys­tems.

A fur­ther $12 mil­lion is set aside for the Beetham waste­water treat­ment plant, which serves about 300,000 peo­ple in greater Port-of-Spain and Diego Mar­tin.

Po­lice and Coast Guard fund­ing

The se­cu­ri­ty al­lo­ca­tion to­tals $471.2 mil­lion, or 11.8 per cent of the cap­i­tal pro­gramme.

The Po­lice Ser­vice’s $230.5 mil­lion al­lo­ca­tion in­cludes $20 mil­lion for ve­hi­cles, $20 mil­lion for op­er­a­tional equip­ment and $26 mil­lion for re­pairs.

The Coast Guard is al­lo­cat­ed $114 mil­lion, in­clud­ing $72 mil­lion for main­te­nance of two Austal-built Cape Class pa­trol ves­sels and 12 Damen in­ter­cep­tors. A fur­ther $20 mil­lion is al­lo­cat­ed for fa­cil­i­ties at Staubles Bay and $10 mil­lion for Ce­dros.

The Prison Ser­vice is al­lo­cat­ed $25.4 mil­lion, while $27.3 mil­lion is ear­marked for the Mu­nic­i­pal Po­lice.

Hous­ing and land dis­tri­b­u­tion

Hous­ing ini­tia­tives in­clude $41 mil­lion for ur­ban up­grad­ing and re­vi­tal­i­sa­tion, along­side $30 mil­lion for re­pairs to HDC rental apart­ment blocks in north­ern, cen­tral and south­ern Trinidad.

The Land for the Land­less pro­gramme is al­lo­cat­ed $20 mil­lion for lots at Are­na, Bal­main, Cou­va and San Fer­nan­do. The pro­gramme pro­vides for 199-year deeds of lease.

In To­ba­go, $17.4 mil­lion is al­lo­cat­ed for hous­ing projects in Cas­tara, Blenheim and Rise­land.

Oth­er ma­jor in­vest­ments

The wider pro­gramme in­cludes $261.1 mil­lion for school re­pairs dur­ing the va­ca­tion pe­ri­od, $100 mil­lion for lap­tops and tablets, $80 mil­lion for dial­y­sis ser­vices, $50 mil­lion for adult car­diac ser­vices and $15 mil­lion to ad­dress sur­gi­cal back­logs.

Road and drainage projects in­clude $150 mil­lion for the Pro­gramme for Up­grad­ing and Im­prov­ing Ac­cess to Land, aimed at set­tling con­tracts and com­plet­ing rur­al ac­cess roads and drainage works, and $60 mil­lion for pack­ages as­so­ci­at­ed with the Solomon Ho­choy High­way Ex­ten­sion’s north­ern link to Point Fortin.

The pro­gramme al­so in­cludes tourism up­grades in To­ba­go, agri­cul­tur­al projects and in­vest­ments in dig­i­tal gov­ern­ment ser­vices.

The Gov­ern­ment has al­lo­cat­ed $3.9996 bil­lion for 1,272 projects in fis­cal 2027, about $100.4 mil­lion, or 2.4 per cent, be­low the $4.1 bil­lion ap­proved for cap­i­tal ex­pen­di­ture in fis­cal 2026.

How­ev­er, on­ly $2.8461 bil­lion of the pre­vi­ous year’s al­lo­ca­tion was spent, rep­re­sent­ing an ab­sorp­tion rate of 69.4 per cent.

The Gov­ern­ment at­trib­uted de­lays to pro­cure­ment and ad­min­is­tra­tive ad­just­ments fol­low­ing the full procla­ma­tion of the Pub­lic Pro­cure­ment and Dis­pos­al of Pub­lic Prop­er­ty (Amend­ment and Val­i­da­tion) Act.

For 2027, $3.8071 bil­lion, or 95.2 per cent of the cap­i­tal pro­gramme, will be fund­ed do­mes­ti­cal­ly, with the re­main­ing $192.5 mil­lion com­ing from ex­ter­nal fi­nanc­ing.

The ef­fec­tive­ness of the pro­gramme will ul­ti­mate­ly de­pend on whether the al­lo­ca­tions trans­late in­to more re­li­able wa­ter sup­plies, im­proved se­cu­ri­ty ser­vices, and tan­gi­ble progress in hous­ing and in­fra­struc­ture for com­mu­ni­ties.