Housing Minister Ashfield DeVent said he was pleased with the progress of the construction of 16 homes at Anchorage Road, St. George?s.

However, Opposition Senate Leader Kim Swan said he felt the demolition of the Government property cut the heart out of a community.

?Its progressing as planned,? Mr. DeVent said yesterday.

The four old buildings at Anchorage Road, which belonged to the Bermuda Housing Corporation, were dilapidated and required refurbishment.

Last year, Government said the most economical method was to knock them all down and build from scratch, a plan which brought screams from the Opposition, which said the buildings could be refurbished separately, thus allowing existing residents to remain in the area.

But by the start of this year, all tenants had been relocated and deconstruction of the buildings began.

?I?m quite happy with the work that?s going on down there and I?m looking forward to the July, 2006 completion date,? Mr. DeVent said.

?I am looking forward to having brand new and improved units for people.?

He said that no decision had yet been made about the price of rents for the new homes.

?We are at the early stages of just bringing that whole building back to being new and improved,? Mr. Devent said.

As far as he knew, all of the former Anchorage Road tenants were still with BHC, he said.

?None of them were put out on the street,? he said. ?And after all of that noise you don?t hear anything about it at this point.?

However, Sen. Swan said he was concerned about the ?busting up? of the community at Anchorage Road.

?This Government has not done well by these people at all and that?s where my concern is,? he said.

?Renovating those places was on the cards a long time ago before it was commenced. I look forward to people being welcomed in there, but I would have felt a lot better had the commitment to a community been there before the renovations.?

He said Government turned its back on the people at Anchorage Road, and accused Mr. DeVent of never visiting the residents there.

?I don?t care if people vote for me, I care about family and doing right by people,? he said.