Government has approved a controversial 196-home development in St David?s.

But the Opposition is crying foul after it was passed by Ministerial decree rather than through the usual Planning process.

The plan provides for 196 homes including 83 affordable housing units ? four fewer than originally planned ? as well as retail units, a community building and open spaces.

Known as Southside Village, it will be situated at Higgs Bay, St. George?s Harbour, on either side of St. David?s Road.

The housing plan, granted permission by Environment Minister Neletha Butterfield on October 16, includes:

114 two-storey, two-bedroom attached houses of 960 square feet floor space

44 two-storey, three-bedroom townhouses of 1,610 square feet of floor space

22 two-storey, four-bedroom attached houses of 1,960 square feet of floor space

12 one-bedroom apartments and four two-bedroom apartments above ground floor retail units around a public square

The amenity plan is:

Five retail units and a day care centre on the ground floor of three, three-storey buildings on either side of the public square

q A two-storey community centre of approximately 2,100 square feet at the north of the square

q Realignment and improvements to St. David?s Road and the development of access roads and parking

q The development of landscaped common open space and play areas with a continuous right of way along the foreshore.

The Southside Village development is being handled by Bermuda Homes for People which submitted the plans in July.

The low cost homes will be sold to lower income Bermudians starting at around $199,000, while the rest of the homes will be sold at market prices, starting at around $599,000.

Bermuda Homes for People, which includes well known figures such as businessman Jan Spiering and lawyer Victoria Pearman on its prospective board, is going through the process of incorporation. Work is set to start in the new year.

However, St. David?s MP Suzann Holshouser is crying foul after Government approved the plan by Ministerial order rather than putting it before the Development Applications Board.

She said: ?Traditionally, when Government strays from the normal manner in which Planning permission is granted by issuing Ministerial permission, the community is offered the opportunity to stand before the Development Applications Board (DAB) to talk through their objections,? she said.

?However, neither myself nor any other member of the community have been offered such an opportunity, which I find typical of a Government bound and determined to do what they want with total disregard for the people of Bermuda, particularly, in this situation, the people of St. David?s.

?This is a far cry from transparency. It is the people of Bermuda the Government represent, and is the obligation as servants that the people be treated with the respect they deserve.?

She cited other situations under the previous United Bermuda Party government when Ministerial permission was granted and a special hearing before the DAB was planned was the Tynes Bay Development together with the Ritz Carlton Development in Warwick.

But Environment Permanent Secretary Brian Rowlinson said: ?Ms Holshouser?s comments on the ?normal manner? are wrong on all counts. ?

He said eight special development orders were signed by UBPEnvironment Ministers. None was the subject of a hearing before the DAB, including the Ritz Carlton order in March, 1991.

?The Tynes Bay application was the subject of a lengthy and exhaustive hearing,?he said. ?However, Planning permission was granted by the Development Applications Board and not by special development order.

Mr.Rowlinson said the application was advertised and was subject to public scrutiny, to review by planners and other affected government agencies and was discussed at a public meeting with residents.

?The objections made by local residents were taken into consideration by the planners during the processing of the application and prior to making the order,?he said, adding that Ms Butterfield followed the same process as at least seven of her predecessors.

He said the project would allow 98 Bermudian families to own their own homes when they could never expect to otherwise and another 98 Bermudian families would be able to compete for the market homes, all of which will be priced well below the current average house price.

?The Minister fails to understand how Government support for this project can be described as ?disregard for the people of Bermuda? ? quite the opposite is true,? he said.

Mrs. Holshouser said it was dangerous to try to solve the housing crisis with hasty plans that would waste ?our precious limited land ... without developing a national housing strategy for long-term approaches to the problems of affordability and availability?.