With lack of affordable housing, immigrant and low-income families have been building or "rescuing" abandoned land in Puerto Rico for decades. From 1998 through 2010, the squatter community of Villas del Sol, located in the municipality of Toa Baja, grew to over 200 families. Mostly Dominican immigrants, the residents acknowledged their illegal occupation of the land and connection to utilities, but claimed they had few alternatives. Even though the law was not on their side, they fought the forced eviction claiming it is a human right to acquire housing when an unjust social order like poverty is preventing it.
