Shelter Coordination Meeting

Sectoral Co-ordination Meeting on Shelter

Friday, November 9th, 2001

Chaired by Dr. Tom Corsellis, UNHCR Shelter Co-ordinator


Introductory remarks:


The Chair proposed the following agenda:

  1. Report from the CRIM
    - submissions of LoBs

  2. Areas of Responsibility, progress, and other activities
    - Skopje
    - Tetovo
    - Kumanovo

  3. ICRC and names-to-houses for Cats 3 and 4

  4. Quick Impacts Projects

  5. Host families EP, MCI, SNI

  6. Experiences so far in shelter implementation

  7. Any other business


1. Report from the CRIM


The Chair briefed that two conclusions came out from the last CRIM meeting of Wednesday, 7 November 2001:

- the submissions of the List of Beneficiaries (LoBs) should include the unique house identifiers, to allow revisiting of Cat 2 houses for later reconstruction;
- the importance was stressed of the attendance by all concerned actors at the CRIM meetings.

The Chair observed that the second conclusion was also relevant to shelter coordination meetings, noting the absence of a representative of the EU/EAR.

Concerning the request for inclusion of unique house identifiers in the LoBs, IMG explained that those concerning the houses that had been physically assessed for damage by IMG could be found on the IMG maps available from the IMG web site. He stressed that the unique house identifiers should be made available and submitted in digital format to allow their further use. As for the GPS equipment, SNI was now providing it for marking the houses in Aracinovo.


2. Areas of Responsibility (AoR)

Updated AoR spreadsheet was presented that has been slightly altered to include revised housing damage assessment figures. This is to allow better planning and provide more accurate information, since the housing damage figures entered previously were coming from the IMG assessment, which did not physically cover 40% of the houses. The Chair noted that in order to provide for timely updates, UNHCR Shelter Coordination has been contacting agencies individually over the past week to collect the information needed.

Participants were invited to review the AoR spreadsheet and provide latest information in case they have not already done so.

The Chair highlighted one more time the importance of providing timely, accurate and definite updates by agencies. Failure to provide this information is blocking activities on the ground and may cause unjustified delays. In response to this, IMG suggested that the Shelter Group could consider asking CRIM to write officially to agencies that had committed to undertake housing repair and have not started any activity yet, setting deadlines for start of activities after which the work will be given to other partners.

Mr. Talmon l'Armee of IMG announced that although IMG mandate for reconstruction was coming to an end next week, EC will continue to fund them for continued reconstruction coordination. IMG also planned to undertake the reconstruction of several hundred Cat 2-4 houses in Cair, Kondovo, Kumanovo and Lipkovo. Concrete figures will be available for sharing once the contract is signed with the Dutch Government.


3. ICRC and names-to-houses for Cats 3 and 4

The Chair reported, at the request of ICRC, that the housing damage data for Cat 3 and Cat 4 houses is linked with the new ICRC distribution lists that are produced within the process of IDP re-registration. This will be made in a way that ICRC will provide agencies reconstructing category 3 and 4 houses with the names of the house owners, linked to the IMG unique house identifiers. This will speed the reconstruction process. If agencies considered this would affect their work they should let the Chair know.


4. Quick Impact Projects (QIPs)

An updated list of QIPs proposals approved after holding of the 4th Selection Committee the day before was presented to the meeting . General comment to the list of proposals approved so far was that most of them still concerned schools which were in turn seen as priority by the municipal authorities. Most of the proposals were still coming from Kumanovo and Skopska Crna Gora areas which could be explained by the engagement of other donors in the Tetovo area. To better cover the QIPs activities in the crisis region, UNHCR has contracted CRS to handle some of the field projects primarily in Tetovo area.

Ms Obradovich highlighted that very little funding, some 10,000 US$ only, was left and encouraged agencies that considered submitting proposals to do so, through Oxfam, by COB on Monday, at the latest. She informed the participants of the strong possibility that new QIP funding will be provided in the beginning of the next year and invited those agencies that were planning to apply and would require more than the funding still available within this QIPs turn, to hold their project proposals until January or February next year.


5. Host families

Due to time restrictions, issue was not discussed.


6. Experiences so far in shelter implementations

Due to time restrictions, issue was not discussed.


7. Any other business

Mr. Talmon l'Armee of IMG announced his leaving and thanked all the participants for their cooperation. The Chair responded by thanking Mr. Talmon l'Armee, personally and on behalf of the agencies present, for his excellent work in supporting repair and reconstruction efforts.

The next Shelter/Infrastructure Coordination Meeting will take place on Friday, 16 November 2001, at 09:15 hours at UNHCR Office.

Useful websites:

1. www.aidmacedonia.org.mk
2. www.img.org.mk

For additional information please contact
Dr. Tom Corsellis, at corselli@unchr.ch

SPesic/OCHA/Skopje

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