New Wedco chairman Ray Charlton said he plans to resume talks with the affordable housing group Habitat for Humanity Bermuda.Proposals for the group to help in repairing old West End homes had faltered as of last year.The One Bermuda Alliance candidate for Sandys North in last December’s general election also said Wedco housing at the Boaz Island Village and Princess Louise condominiums will not be sold.Appraising development plans for the West End, Mr Charlton said funding was the top challenge in his new role.On restoring the ageing housing at Victoria and Albert Row, he said: “Finding the financing will be difficult, and so we do not have definitive plans for Victoria and Albert Row at this time.“There were previously plans created Habitat for Humanity and I will be contacting them to see if they are still interested in working to renovate these units.”Tenants “overwhelmingly” don’t want to see the buildings razed, and Wedco’s current plan is to build 20 new units rather than the 100 planned.The board will also consult with realtors to see if the previously announced rental rates for the units are realistic.“Now that the project is going ahead, even though it’s reduced, financing is the main challenge. That’s taken up a huge chunk of money. There’s not going to be much left.”Just a few weeks into his new job after being appointed by Public Works Minister Trevor Moniz, Mr Charlton said it wasn’t easy after spending so much time as a critic of Wedco.“It’s always easy when you’re on the outside looking in,” he said. “It’s different when you become part of the team.”Mr Charlton said he planned to reach out to British conservationist Ann Coates of the UK’s Naval Docklands Society for advice in sourcing grants to preserve Dockyard architecture.Saving Dockyard’s historic naval crests, however, looks an impossible task.“I wish there was a way of preserving them, but I don’t think it can be done,” Mr Charlton said.The walls were delisted under former Wedco chair Walter Lister, who said that due to the structure of the walls, the murals couldn’t be dismantled and replaced elsewhere.Mr Charlton said: “I know we have high resolution photos taken of each one. I imagine sometime in the future these images could be put back onto another wall.”For now, Mr Charlton’s main priority is examining development plans for a marina in Dockyard’s South Basin — and plans for a sprawling sports, art and entertainment centre, the CUT complex.“So far the South Basin developers have briefed us on their marina plans — now we as a board must mull it over,” he said.“My personal thinking is, if it’s good for Wedco, it also has to be good for the West End and good for Bermuda. It has to do that, and not expose Government to any more debt, and create jobs and be done openly and transparently.“Driving into and around Boaz Island, Ireland Island and the Dockyard, there are many areas where I would like to make immediate improvements. Being realistic however, right now, the priority is to install the 20 new housing units and the infrastructure improvement project that will result in there being waste water treatment capability available to most of the Wedco-controlled land.”He added: “I just hope and pray that in the time I’m in here I can live up to what I was hoping to do.”The job is a one-year post in theory — although predecessor Mr Lister led the Board of Wedco over a span of 14 years.Useful website: www.thewestend.bm