Anglican Church received no money for Glebe Hill land – Bishop

Providing land to the landless parishioners of the parish of St Patrick was the dream of the late Bishop of the Windward Islands Sir Cuthbert Woodroffe.{{more}}

On November 18, 1982, Woodroffe, who was then also Archbishop of the West Indies, conveyed several acres of land at Barrouallie, owned by the Anglican Church, to the Christian Council, so that they could distribute it to the people of the area to build homes.

The legal document conveying the land to the Christian Council says that the Incorporated Trustees of the Anglican Church, “freely and voluntarily and without valuable consideration GRANT and CONVEY unto the GRANTEES ALL and SINGUALR the said hereditaments to HAVE and TO HOLD the same UNTO AND TO THE USE OF THE GRANTEES their successors and assigns for ever to be applied as hereinbefore mentioned and for no other purpose whatsoever.”

Present Bishop of the Windward Islands C Leopold Friday told SEARCHLIGHT on Monday that the Anglican Church received absolutely no money for the land.

He said Archbishop Woodroffe gave the land to the St Vincent and the Grenadines Christian Council because at that time, the Caribbean Conference of Churches, of which the SVG Christian Council was a member, was very vibrant.

“I guess that he felt that it would have been better to have it done (through the Christian Council) for as I said, in those days, they had the Caribbean Conference of Churches, and they were doing a lot of things, helping people to develop businesses, it would have been easier through the Christian Council to do it then, to get the help to do whatever needed to be done, surveying, etc,” Friday said.

He however explained that for some reason, the distribution of all of the land was not done.

“Somehow or the other, they did not get to do it fully. One or two people were able to get, but the whole thing was not done fully,” the Bishop said.

Friday also explained that the Christian Council was having some challenges getting the land surveyed and distributed, so they asked the government to assist with it.

“There were problems establishing boundaries,” he explained.

After years of negotiations, the government decided to buy the land from the Christian Council at 50 cents and sell it to the people at 10 cents.

SEARCHLIGHT tried reaching Chairman of the Christian Council Reverend Adrian Odle for comment, but up to press time, we were unable to do so.

An executive member of the Christian Council however told SEARCHLIGHT that whatever funds the Christian Council receives from the sale of the land will be plowed by into the community at Glebe Hill, Barrouallie.

“We have already identified a project,” the person, who did not wish to be identified, said.