Chairlady’s Report 2019

CHAIRLADY’S REPORT 2019

Good evening everyone. Thank you George for the welcome and introduction.

Thank you to all our members for their support this past year and for taking the time to attend. Your support is vital to the success of your RA.

A special thank you to the Committee, their spouses and families for the time they dedicate to be on the committee and for the work they do.

Tony, a huge thank you to you and especially Noreen, who could unfortunately not be here tonight, for your dedication, and hard work in managing our financials and accounts in a professional, efficient and transparent manner.

We’re happy to have Greg Pearce with us tonight from CSS. He is recovering well and we wish him a full and total recovery.

We would also like to thank:

Weltevreden Primary for the use of their hall.

David Brand for his advice and involvement in various matters.

Lisa Evans for arranging the Urn for our refreshments

Gillian Shead; Tracy Schloesher and Heather for assistance in registrations

Ian Wylde for his assistance in collecting and formatting research projects

Peter Burkimsher for his daily walks in our greenbelt, picking up litter and alerting the committee to matters needing attention.

Brett Mynhardt for organising and sponsoring the materials and for organising the labour to refurbish all our palisade fences.

Liz & Dick Williams and family; Heather Smit; Gillian Shead; Arlene and her lovely daughters; Trevor Harty; Rob Cliford; Theresa Bower; Gareth Lingens and Karen Barrow for dropping off the AGM invite pamphlets door to door.

The entire social committee for your wonderful execution and success of the Easter Egg Hunt

Graham and Laura Knight from UpsiDaisy for the Greenbelt Maintenance.

Last but not least, CSS for their dedication and support in crime prevention and fighting.

The current committee has served for the past 2 years since the AGM of June 2017.

With the support and commitment of our members the WRA Committee has this year continued on our pro-active, positive and progressive approach and successfully made many significant changes.

In this, our second year:

• We organised a domestic watch meeting to educate the domestics on home safety.

• We installed the first live CCTV camera point at the Lobelia/Cockspur entrance to our RA.

• The switch over from WhatsApp to Telegram and the cleaning out of our social media groups was a very time consuming exercise checking which members were missing from the groups and assisting people to do the switch over.

• Liaising with the Sewerage Upgrade contractors and unhappy residents to achieve satisfactory results.

• We had our palisades repaired along Jim Fouche’ where storm damage caused part of the fence to be washed out a couple of years before. We also gave all the palisades some much needed refurbishments and a new coat of paint which as sponsored by Paintcor, through Brett Mynhardt.

• Not long after the refurbishment and repair, a MVA damaged a section of the palisade on Jim Fouche”. With the assistance of CSS a registration number was used to identify the vehicle owner, which enabled the WRA to obtain a case number and we managed with the advice from David Brand to have the repair done by City Parks at no expense to the RA. Brett from Paintcor once more supplied the paint to repaint this section.

• The greatest part of this year was spent on trying to build our membership numbers in order to assist the financial commitment to afford security upgrades.

Membership in the beginning of 2018 was around 284, many homes were sold, probably the most in very many years decreasing our membership. However, after telemarketing perseverance many hours of phone calls and emails we are now at 328 and hopefully the figure will continue to rise. I believe that this is an encouraging percentage increase. However, we are still not even at a 50% membership yet wrt membership ratio to the number of homes in our RA! Much need for growth still.

• We organised a well-attended and very enjoyable Easter Egg Hunt for our RA community where much fun was had by all. If you missed it, you really missed out.

• Heather and I did a drive around noting every home and which security company they are with not only to invite those residents where there was no security board, but also to make a note of WRA members who had no boards up and also to have boards removed where members had left.

• The Fire Hydrant map was circulated and studied and we asked members to please provide feedback as to where Fire Hydrants were seen on their streets, or were missing. We sadly received feedback from 2 people out of 31 streets! George our deputy Chair, assisted by Ian Wylde, took on the project of walking every street to mark these positions. They have done an excellent job of not only marking every current Hydrant on the map, but every missing one, every hidden one and those that appear to be in poor condition; this information has been sent to David Brand who is liaising with the correct persons who according to feed-back will not only address the condition, reinstatement of missing ones but also organise the service of all Hydrants which is something I do not believe we have seen done in many many years.

• Vumatel fibre roll-out cables were laid, but many of the utility boxes on the pavements are broken or in poor condition; George assisted by Ian Wylde has documented coupled by photos which have been forwarded to Vumatel with a letter asking them to replace all the damaged boxes or risk being held liable for any injury caused by the damaged boxes. We have been assured of corrective action.

• Electrical mains boxes are and have been in a sorry state for years. Once again, we requested residents to provide feedback and sadly 3 or 4 residents responded. George has again accurately mapped these and we will be sending this info to City Power, the request for refurbishment of the mains boxes as well as the mini subs have already gone into our IDP budget requests in December 2018, but with this additional detailed info to back up our request, we are optimistic to get the worst ones taken care of.

• The Fire Hydrant water and manhole cover thieves were caught, this is thanks to video footage of them in action. We’re pleased to report that this resulted in the suspected team being relieved of their jobs after getting away with it for a couple of years in various areas. We are further pleased to report that all our known missing manhole covers have eventually all been closed and secured after a sharp email to both JRA and JWater for refusing to accept responsibility and accountability. After a meeting with Jhb Water it was confirmed that the manholes in question were the responsibility of JRA and not Jhb Water.

• The ongoing investigations into the fuel spill into our river from the Total Garage has resulted in 2 new separator tanks being installed at the garage and the assurance that the run off from the forecourt was being channelled into the correct waste pipes. We still have no positive response wrt City Parks permitting Total SA environmental dept. to perform soil tests in the greenbelt.

• Greenbelt maintenance was a challenge in the two sections of our greenbelt where the sewerage contractors were working, but the areas seem to have recovered and have rehabilitated well.

• The Cell C tower site has been a headache causing bordering residents to experience disturbed sleep due to droning from the generator. George offered to go twice a day to switch the generator on in the morning and off at night to assist affected residents. This went on for months. George eventually assisted in a deal with one of the neighbours to provide power to the tower in exchange for a fee from Cell C to cover usage. This was done and peace has returned to those residents. The maintenance of the grounds is a constant cause for concern. City Parks and our Greenbelt service provider have assisted in keeping the erf cleaned. Contractually Cell C is supposed to do regular grounds maintenance.

• A letter has been sent to Cell C giving them notice of our intention to clean it out at their expense. We await response.

• The pavements at the Spar were cleaned a few times, but it remains a challenge. We ask residents to discourage your domestics from gathering there to drink, litter and cause public disturbance.

• A survey in respect of the closure of Hyacinth at Jim Fouche’ was done by Rudi Brekelmans on Hyacinth.

There is agreement on this plan of action. The Committee have done the groundwork of exploring the options and have provided the information to Rudi. We have requested that the Hyacinth residents form a sub-committee to see this project to its conclusion under the guidance of the Committee. We will set up a meeting with this committee to guide and advice on the way forward.

The Committee would like to thank residents who do report matters like Traffic Lights, street lights, potholes, water or sewerage leaks, dumped rubble and other matters. This is our suburb and we individually need to take responsibility to report incidences to the correct support channels for assistance.

The WRA will always be ready to assist and escalate to attempt to resolve in a more timeous manner.

PLEASE PROVIDE reference numbers.

With the Fire Works season coming up again toward the last quarter of the year, we request that you refrain from using loud explosive types of fireworks;

Please spread the word to your non-member neighbours.

Fireworks cause an incredible burden on animals, and pet owners, sensitive and elderly residents, organisations like the SPCA, vets and CPF volunteers who are called out to rescue trapped, impaled and injured animals due to resultant fall out from this abusive practice.

Residents who live on the Greenbelt especially are asked to please assist and make sure you report:

Dumping or any suspicious activity in the Greenbelt.

If you are building, please make sure you leave it as clean as you found it.

Residents / home owners are continually using the greenbelt to offload or dump building materials and not clearing up after the completion of their building projects.

The committee continually have to chase after builders who leave building rubble in the greenbelt due to residents / owners who have an “I don’t care or I don’t know what to do attitude.

Dumped building or garden rubble are a risk to personal injury, it makes greenbelt maintenance difficult and spoils the upkeep of the area paid for by our RA contributions.

Please be considerate and appreciative of our lovely greenbelt. We are blessed as a community to have such an area.

We notice that many vehicles are driving through the greenbelt. Please, this is not allowed. City Parks are turning a blind eye to our security vehicles driving through because it is a security matter. No other vehicles, especially Quad bikes are allowed in the greenbelt. Report these to JMPD as soon as they are seen.