Background
In October 2000, the city of Cali, situated in the south-western part of Colombia, identified regularization of land tenure as a priority in its Municipal Development Plan and Land Use Master Plan (Plan de Ordenamiento Territorial). In line with this priority, the Cities Alliance, a World Bank/UN-HABITAT-initiated coalition of cities and their development partners, began assisting the local administration in identifying and implementing a city development strategy to solve the various problems affecting the city, including lack of adequate land use planning and a housing deficit of approximately 67,000 units. This project aims to integrate informal settlements into the formal urban structure of the city through appropriate planning and coordination with other urban development actors and institutions involved in slum upgrading programmes. It is envisaged that legal and physical regularization, accompanied by complementary programmes to access subsidies and credit for shelter and infrastructure improvement, will strengthen community assets and trigger processes of economic development and increased productivity. The objectives of the project are to:
Regularize land tenure for 6,000 slum dwellers and start upgrading activities; and Support the Municipality of Cali in promoting and coordinating regularization of land tenure and slum upgrading programmes.
Activities
A public-private steering committee has leveraged substantial support and commitment for the slum upgrading and land regularization project from a wide range of public and private agencies and organizations. This has led to a series of unprecedented operational agreements with:
- Public Notaries to significantly reduce costs of legal studies of title deeds;
- Public service agencies to ensure prompt and complete coverage of water, electricity, sanitation and garbage collection;
- The local university to obtain student support for cost-free legal studies;
- The neighbouring military battalion to provide support in organizing community contracting;
- The city administration to facilitate the regulations to ensure local contracting in all public investments; and
- The Ministry of Housing to ensure availability of housing subsidies (for new as well as existing housing stock).
Operations started in September 2004.
Results
Operational agreements have been established and the public-private team is being expanded and consolidated. 
