Community Land Trusts and Informal Settlements

This report presents an analysis conducted to assess the feasibility of community land trusts (CLT) developed by the Caño Martin Peña communities in Puerto Rico as instruments to regularize and secure tenure for favelas in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. CLTs have proven to be effective in ensuring affordable housing and regularizing land tenure; this has protected low-income communities and minorities from involuntary displacement through eviction or gentrification, which has been a growing problem for favelas in Rio. The project is inspired by and drawn from the legal, political and social experience of the Caño Martin Peña community in San Juan, Puerto Rico, which successfully implemented a CLT. This working paper presents the results of the exchanges between community leaders and staff of the Fideicomiso de la Tierra del Caño Martín Peña in Puerto Rico and community leaders and professionals working on unplanned, informal settlements in Brazil. The report analyzes criteria for the implementation of CLTs in informal settlements, particularly favela communities in Rio de Janeiro, with a focus on legal strategies that are deemed necessary to implement CLTs under the current Brazilian legal system. The paper also presents recommendations and necessary steps for community leaders and professionals interested in establishing a CLT as an instrument to regularize land tenure and mitigate poverty in their community.