MELISSA RELIEF UNDER SCRUTINY - CAPRI report flags delays in spending donations, gaps in roof-repair records and lingering disruption to schools

Nearly a year after Hurricane Melissa devastated sections of Jamaica, a new Caribbean Policy Research Institute (CAPRI) report has raised questions about the country’s ability to turn disaster donations into timely assistance. The report cited delays in spending relief funds, gaps in roof-repair records and prolonged disruption to schools and essential services.

CAPRI will officially launch its report, Higher Ground: Lessons from Hurricane Melissa for Resilience, Relief, and Recovery on Wednesday, the anniversary of Melissa’s landfall, at the Montego Bay Civic Centre in western Jamaica, beginning at 6 p.m.

The report found that only J$26.2 million of the J$1.4 billion in cash donations received by the Office of Disaster Preparedness and Emergency Management (ODPEM) for Melissa had been spent four months after the storm. That represented just 1.8 per cent of the donations, with expenditure unchanged up to the start of April.

ODPEM said it needed authorisation from the Ministry of Finance and the Public Service before the funds could be spent. However, CAPRI noted that ODPEM did not write to the ministry seeking approval to spend approximately J$500 million on shelter repairs until February 4, 2026, more than three months after Melissa made landfall.

The researchers also found that J$138.8 million and US$101,974 in donations received for Hurricane Beryl remained unspent when Melissa struck.

“Jamaica arranged its disaster financing in advance, but its disaster delivery after the fact,” CAPRI stated, arguing that the systems needed to turn funding into relief — including beneficiary records, vulnerability registers and procedures for managing donated funds — either did not exist or had not been made to work.

ROOFS DEADLINE EXTENDED

The Government last week extended the deadline for beneficiaries to redeem Phase One grants under its Restoration of Owner-Occupied Family Shelter (ROOFS) programme to December 31, 2026, as it steps up outreach to people severely affected by Hurricane Melissa.

The Ministry of Labour and Social Security said it had recorded 118,365 household assessments and identified 106,350 people for support as at September 2026, including 49,002 ROOFS beneficiaries. However, it was not immediately clear how many grants had been redeemed or how many damaged homes had been repaired.

The ministry said last week that it was working with communities and payment providers to help beneficiaries access outstanding grants.

The programme’s implementation comes against the background of CAPRI’s concerns about the recording and verification of roofing materials and repairs.

Of four contracts for roofing materials valued at J$167 million, three were awarded to suppliers that did not have valid procurement registration or current tax compliance certificates at the time. The awards were reportedly justified under emergency procurement guidance, the report outlined.

It added: “Of the J$123 million in building supplies delivered to Jamaica Defence Force distribution points, only J$89 million, or 72 per cent, was formally acknowledged as received, leaving J$34 million in materials unverified and unaccounted for by either receiving party. No agency in the chain of command treated verification of completed repairs as its responsibility ... .”

ODPEM reported that 421 roofs had been repaired, but CAPRI said the Auditor General’s Department could not obtain verifiable documentation to support the figure. The report also identified gaps in beneficiary selection, independent verification, repair approvals and completion reports.

SCHOOLS STILL STRUGGLING

The report also highlighted the strain on Jamaica’s education system following repeated natural disasters.

Hurricane Beryl reportedly damaged 364 schools in July 2024. By January 2025, repairs had been completed at 87 of those institutions, according to CAPRI.

Nine months later, Melissa damaged 721 of Jamaica’s 1,010 public schools. When the 2026-2027 academic year opened last month, the Ministry of Education, Skills, Youth and Information reported that 92 per cent of schools were operating at full capacity.

“A year after the landfall, some 80 public schools were still teaching in tents and on rotation ...” the report stated, noting that principals in western parishes had reported incomplete repairs and undelivered furniture in the first week of the term.

“Learning from home, introduced as a stopgap, has become the operating model for that part of the system, which risks compounding learning loss,” it continued, adding that close to 90 per cent of designated emergency shelters were schools and approximately 78 per cent of those schools were damaged by Melissa.

ESSENTIAL SERVICES HIT

The hurricane also disrupted electricity, water and healthcare services. CAPRI argued that the recovery of essential services was slowed by their dependence on one another.

More than 532,000 Jamaica Public Service customers — approximately 77 per cent of its customer base — lost electricity at the peak of the disruption.

Four days after landfall, 395 of the National Water Commission’s 570 production and pumping facilities were out of service. About two-thirds of those disruptions resulted from electricity failures rather than direct damage to water infrastructure.

The health sector was also affected, with 143 public health facilities damaged. CAPRI projected that the closure of five hospitals would leave at least 31,000 people without access to specialised and radiology services.

“Jamaica’s public services came back slowly and unevenly, and the systems that failed have not yet been redesigned,” the report stated.

CAPRI estimated Melissa’s overall effects at J$1.95 trillion, or US$12.2 billion, making it the costliest disaster in Jamaica’s recorded history. Housing accounted for approximately J$687 billion in physical damage, with about 85,000 homes damaged or destroyed, affecting more than 250,000 people.

corey.robinson@gleanerjm.com