Site Lifecycle

Site Lifecycle: Setup to Closure
 

Site Selection & Site Planning

The location and layout of a site or collective centre have critical impacts on the health, wellbeing and protection of the displaced population. Physical infrastructure and environment can also ease or hinder a Site Management Agency’s ability to manage daily activities, ensure participation and develop relationships with the host community. Just as important as the physical location and layout of the site is the process by which a site is established, grows, changes, improves and ultimately closes down. The process of planning a site is both technical and social.  While sites are often set up with the expectation that they will be short term, planning should always aim for longer-term needs, expansion and unexpected eventualities.  The needs and capacities of the host community should also be assessed in relation to the services, infrastructure and assets established – such as schools, community halls, roads, electricity cables and water points – which may also benefit local communities. National authorities are ultimately responsible for allocation of land [1].

At global level, the Shelter Cluster is responsible for site planning and deployment of site planners, complemented by CCCM responsibilities on community engagement, IM, and service monitoring & coordination. CCCM, WASH, and Shelter Clusters must coordinate and collaborate closely on site planning and site development, including ensuring that GBV risks and mitigation measures are taken into account.  

Responsibilities [2] for each activity relating to site planning should be clearly defined. Capacities may vary according to context and responsibilities should be adapted accordingly. See Toolkit Section 1.9 Inter-Cluster Coordination CCCM & Shelter Clusters Inter-Cluster Matrix CCCM-Shelter proposed accountabilities and responsibilities (2015) to support you to define responsibilities at country level.  

Standards for settlement planning and service provision exist at global level (i.e. Sphere, Minimum Standards for Camp Management), however other standards may be incorporated or take priority according to context - for example national standards – and should be discussed by the cluster actors. 

When establishing new sites, or expanding existing ones, you should seek technical site planning expertise – usually from the Shelter/CCCM Cluster Lead Agency.  

[1] Minimum Standards for Camp Management, 2021

[2] Responsibility means ensuring, where possible, that the job gets done, not necessarily doing it.

Site Maintenance & Improvement

“The Site Management Agency should ensure clear responsibilities are in place for the maintenance of sectoral infrastructure to agreed standards, whether by humanitarian service providers, local/municipal authorities, or community self-maintenance e.g. through committees. Ensuring the maintenance of communal site infrastructure such as roads and distribution sites is typically the responsibility of the Site Management Agency. They may undertake the work themselves, or coordinate it with other service providers, depending on factors including budgets and capacity” [3]. The CCCM Cluster should raise issues with other Clusters that cannot be resolved by CCCM partners at site level, as needed, and support advocacy efforts for resource mobilization. 

Site safety must be a priority for the CCCM Cluster and Cluster members, in addition to physical maintenance, with the aim to improve safety and dignity of all individuals living in the site. CCCM actors should facilitate community participation and promote community ownership. The Cluster coordination team should seek to collaborate with other actors (e.g. GBV or Child Protection Sub-Cluster) on initiatives such as Site Safety Audits, and promote strong community participation mechanisms at site level with different groups e.g. women, children, people with disabilities, older persons.  

[3] Camp Management Toolkit, 2015

Decongestion

‘Decongestion’ is the reconfiguration of a site, or part of a site, to improve living conditions when the standards agreed for space requirements are exceeded – which can contribute to heightened protection risks. Decongestion usually requires some or all IDP families to move (relocation), some or full re-planning of shelters, infrastructure, and services, and might require new site development in the existing site or a new location. Decongestion is a complex exercise, that can be costly, and itself lead to protection risks. Its planning should involve all relevant service providers in the site, local authorities, community members in the area to be decongested and in any relocation area, and site planning / site development specialists as needed.  

Relocation

Relocation of families might be required within a site or between sites, for example due to closure of a site, environmental risks such as flooding, or to allow for site decongestion. Relocations are complex, often present protection risks, can undermine existing community structures and capacities, and should only be undertaken if there are no alternatives. A relocation might be planned over a long period of time or might take place rapidly following an emergency. Planning must be done in consultation with all stakeholders, including the community that will move and any community in the destination location.  

A Protection Risk Analysis should be conducted by the CCCM partner/Cluster with Protection partners/Cluster as part of the planning process.  

Relocations should be voluntary, safe, informed, and dignified, allow individual families to make their own decisions about how and where to move, and take into account different capacities of individuals providing support for older persons and people with disabilities.  

Departures

Displaced families’ departure from a site might be spontaneous (families voluntarily return home or resettle elsewhere); assisted (financial or logistical support is provided to families to return or resettle), or forced.  

Depending on the context, guidance and standardised processes that the CCCM Cluster might need to put in place to support CCCM response could include: un-enrolment procedures, information materials to support families’ decision-making on when to leave the displacement site and where to move to (in collaboration with other actors, including Protection), and information management systems to track and report on number of families departing and where they will move to.  

Eviction

Displaced families living in displacement sites without formal rights or formal agreement on land use can often be at risk of eviction. Those settled spontaneously, whether on private or public land, are often particularly vulnerable to threat of eviction by landlords or authorities. 

If eviction threats are a risk for IDP families living in displacement sites, the CCCM Cluster should collaborate closely with the Protection Cluster and any HLP Working Group on the appropriate response, as well as with other clusters on operational response in case evictions are carried out. Guidance should contain guiding principles and considerations, if relevant, regarding relocations.   

Necessary work can include: 

• Advocacy 
• Operational guidance for CCCM, Protection & other sector partners as necessary on actions to be taken: 
  • At site level responding to eviction threats 
  • At site level responding to evictions being carried out 
  • In transit and on arrival in destination areas (return or secondary displacement) 
• Tracking eviction threats & evictions, sharing this information as part of advocacy efforts and to inform operational response 

See:  

• Toolkit Section 7.1 Advocacy 
• Toolkit Section 8.9 HLP 

Response at Cluster level, and guidance developed by the Cluster coordination team with partners can include:  

• Eviction tracking – eviction cases, verbal threats and formal notices reported by CCCM partners to the CCCM Cluster coordination team, for example through an eviction tracking matrix. Data is compiled by the Cluster team and shared with key stakeholders (e.g. inter-cluster coordination group, Cluster Lead Agency, donors) for escalation as necessary. 
• Identifying and collaborating with key stakeholders to respond to eviction threats. For example, collaboration with OCHA and the Protection Cluster (with support of the Protection Cluster Lead Agency) for them to engage in negotiations with authorities and landowners, and to mobilize a response as necessary. Particularly close collaboration is usually needed at sub-national level, if a sub-national coordination structure is in place, as negotiations are most likely to be started at the local level.  
• Encouraging close collaboration between CCCM and Protection teams at site level, to engage with community members following eviction threats or notifications. This can include engaging with community leaders in nominating focal points that can be contacted for tracking the communities’ movement and providing timely assistance to the most vulnerable in the location(s) where they settle, in the case that evictions take place before appropriate actions are made. 
• In the case of self-settled sites, permission to remain on the land may be informal. It is therefore important to understand who has the right to use the land and what arrangements have been put in place, to inform any efforts to negotiate and advocate with landowners and authorities on behalf of IDP families.  

Handover of Site Management

Handover/Transition to a new site management agency: The site management agency hands over its responsibility to another agency, organization, or other local entity. The site management agency’s main role here is to ensure that site populations continue to receive appropriate and timely support and service provision during the period.  

Handover is usually done over a period of time, with a clear handover plan agreed by all stakeholders including clear goals, measurable criteria, timelines, and consultation with the site community.  

Consolidation, Closure & Decommissioning

Camps are designed to be depopulated and closed down. Usually, there is a process which also involves a phase of consolidation – a planned process of gradually becoming smaller in both population and geographic area, whereby all remaining parts of the camp come closer together. At the end frequently the most vulnerable families are left – those with no other options. Environmental recovery of the camp location can take years, and needs to be planned from the start of the camp’s existence [4].

Site Closure typical scenarios are [5]: 

• Planned closure: The site management agency can close the site in consultation and collaboration with those affected, in an orderly manner and according to plans. Intention of site residents with regard to durable solution options are well captured and considered. Assistance is provided for repatriation/reintegration to place of origin, (local) integration or resettlement/integration elsewhere. The Site Management Agency’s main role is to ensure that site closure takes place in a planned and consultative manner, and its impact on any residual site populations is mitigated.  
• Unplanned closure: forced returns or evictions of site residents and/or spontaneous closure and return/integration of site residents in places of origin or outside of the displacement site. The Site Management Agency’s main role is to mitigate any negative impact for those affected to the extent possible. With proactive exit plans in place from the early onset of the site life cycle, the scenario of unplanned closure can be managed by the SMA as an anticipated event.  

Although site closure is the final component of the site life cycle, ending operations requires early planning. It is important to note that site closure does not necessarily mean an end to service provision, as some service providers may continue their activities according to the needs of the host community and the residual population in the site [6]. If closure of one site means that the displaced population moves to another planned or spontaneous site, service provision and cluster activities may continue in the new location. Depending on the form of closure and the presence or absence of durable solutions, closure also does not necessarily mean the end of displacement, nor the end of the need for humanitarian assistance. 

In some cases, while assistance and service provision phase out, the site itself does not close, in terms of the removal of its infrastructure or its function as a community location. It may itself become a viable permanent settlement, town or site of economic or social activity. It may also simply return to its previous function.  

Buildings that have been degraded due to their temporary use as collective centres can have a negative impact on the local community. Eventual decommissioning, or rehabilitation and handover, should be defined and agreed with involved stakeholders from the start, or as close as possible to it.  

Whatever the circumstances, careful planning and extensive coordination is crucial and should be carried out in collaboration with national authorities and other key stakeholders, including the legal owners of the land. Together they should ensure that site and host populations participate fully in the process.  

When families are departing from displacement sites, whether voluntarily or forced, the CCCM Cluster should liaise closely with the Protection Cluster, inter-cluster coordination group, and any durable solutions actors or durable solutions coordination mechanism on information-sharing. Particularly if departures are forced, the monitoring of departures, transit, and arrival to destination locations are important to identify, address, and advocate on any protection concerns arising and needs of families. Partial or total unplanned closures that involve forced departures / return require strategic and proactive management mechanisms to be put in place to guarantee the protection of the affected people. See Evictions, above. 

Consolidation might take place within a site, or between two or more sites – where the population size has decreased to the point where it is no longer efficient to continue providing assistance in multiple locations. This involves families moving into the location(s) that will remain open, and closure of other sites/sections of a site.  

The processes of consolidation and closure should be transparent. Participatory consultation processes must be held with all community members in the site, allowing all individuals to input and to access information and ask questions about the process.  

Under all the above circumstances, CCCM Cluster coordination teams should develop with their partners context specific guidance and tools for adequate monitoring and planning.  

Decommissioning is the process of dismantling and managing obsolete, inoperative, or hazardous structures. The decommissioning process includes reaching agreement between humanitarian partners, government, land owners and the surrounding community on the future use of the site. Roles and responsibilities must be agreed on by all relevant stakeholders; in most cases, the Site Management Agency identifies partners willing to assume responsibility for sectoral decommissioning for a specific camp [7]. Support from the CCCM Cluster may be needed to standardize guidance across camps, and to support resource mobilization advocacy if necessary.  

See Camp Closure Guidelines 3.4.2 Infrastructural Elements (Camp Closure Action Plan) for a list of key actions that should be taken.  

[4] Global Shelter Cluster & IOM, Site Planning GBV Guidance, 2016

[5] Minimum Standards for Camp Management, 2021

[6] Global CCCM Cluster, Camp Closure Guidelines, 2014 - Planning Camp Closure

[7] Global CCCM Cluster, Camp Closure Guidelines, 2014

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