Community Land Trusts and Indigenous Communities: From Strategies to Outcomes

The project sought to understand what would be required to develop a model of CLTs for Indigenous communities in New South Wales (NSW), and also identify issues in considering a model for the Northern Territory. Overview Community Land Trusts (CLTs) are a form of common land ownership where land is held by a private non-profit entity and leased on a long-term basis to members of the community or other organisations, while fixtures are owned or purchased by the household. Previous research showed that CLTs might provide a relevant tenure form between rental and outright home ownership for Indigenous households but work was still needed to refine workable models at a local level. The project sought to understand what would be required to develop a model of CLTs for Indigenous communities in New South Wales (NSW), and also identify issues in considering a model for the Northern Territory. The project involved engagement of project partners such as the South Eastern Aboriginal Regional Management Services (SEARMS) in NSW as well as Land Councils and Town Camp organisations in Northern Territory. The project also involved surveys of households, workshops, reviews of current leasehold situations and financial modelling. In NSW, communities were interested in home ownership but were concerned viability may be affected by householder debt. Member organisations of SEARMS were also potentially constrained by existing sub-leases with governments requiring only community rental housing. Exit clauses from sub-leases and removal of caveats on title would need to be explored to enable CLT models to occur. In the Northern Territory, there was also interest but maintaining community integrity and community governance were primary considerations for any future CLT model. While complex, governance and tenure arrangements are possible to amend relatively quickly by government. The researchers argue for a model in which a relevant Indigenous organisation retains an interest in the property and the relationship between the resident and organisation governed by a legal agreement appropriate to the local context and aspirations of community members. The agreement would include details about: upfront price and administration fees; responsibilities for repairs and maintenance; and equity treatment at termination of agreement. Importantly, the model makes no reference to tenure form and does not assume an equity component, in order that it could be adapted to different local contexts and even to the needs of individual households. The NSW feasibility study favored a long-term leasehold model involving use of a 99-year lease that would restart at sale or inheritance, allowing for equity input or withdrawal if required. The model was aimed at households with annual gross income of between $65 000 and $80 000, but because many households already have debt, risk is minimised by requiring a two-year initial period in which the resident would pay an agreed amount into a joint account on top of their administration fee, to be used as the resident’s deposit to secure a mortgage. The research identifies a useful program of activities that could be pursued by policy-makers to implement CLTs at the local level, and also provides a CLT decision making tool to help communities determine whether they need to offer additional housing options and if so the steps to identify needs, objectives and program elements.