Your Sandton MP reflecting on Parliament and political work...
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Dear Constituents, Colleagues and friends.
The first 5000 Club newsletter went out in September 2009 to 1833 people. We have since grown it to 4683 recipients. We should reach the 5000 member milestone next edition or so and are revamping the look and feel and name. Look out for the changes over the next few editions. Thanks to those who have helped grow our informative newsletter. Please keep sending your friends email addresses so that we can add them to our mailing list. We will be adding video clips occasionally. The first one below focuses on the DA campaign on benefits for domestic workers. Please help us get the word out. We need to lobby MP’s from all political parties to get legislation amended to achieve this.
October has been a busy month in Ward 90. We kicked off the month at the Annual Joburg Pride Parade where the DA in Ward 90 and Ward 117 jointly hosted a table at the Zoo Lake showing support for LGBT issues and obtaining 853 signatures on a petition against the practice of “corrective rape”. Cllr Gordon Mackay has drafted a motion on the issue and it will now come before Council at the end of November and will call on the City and the Mayor to join the fight against this inhumane practice.
We have also had a number of service delivery wins, with the Hume, Kent Roads (Dunkeld West) and Hamilton Avenue (Craighall Park) finally receiving some much need patching. William Nicol is being resurfaced between Sandton Drive and Republic and the intersection of William Nicol and Comartie (Sandhurst) has been patched. Significant water problems in Parkmore at the end of October were the result of aging and decaying infrastructure. Working with Parkmore Community Association, Cllr Gordon Mackay has been reassured by Joburg Water that the worst of these pipes will now be replaced.
Stop Press:
The DA in Ward 90 will be hosting an information table at the Rosebank Rooftop Market on 13 November between 10am -12pm. Join Us!
Joburg finances:
Is the Billing crisis really over?
Recent claims by City of Johannesburg (COJ) officials that the City’s very public billing crisis is finally over appear to be a rather overoptimistic assessment of the present experience of many of the City’s long suffering residents.
Whist some improvements have been made, Johannesburg’s billing still leaves a great deal to be desired. Of particular concern is that the Billing crisis has had a very significant impact on the City’s revenue collection. Recent figures indicate a city-wide collection rate of 86% of all bills presented to residents. The City budgets on a 94% collection rate to break even. A revenue shortfall of this magnitude calls into question the City’s ability to function effectively and provide the kind of service delivery that its residents should reasonably expect.
National Treasury requires municipalities to spend 8% of the value of their Plant, Property and Equipment (PPE) on repairs and maintenance as a basic requirement to stop the assets from degrading. Johannesburg only spends 1,5% of its PPE in maintenance of its infrastructure. This will lead to a degradation of the City’s infrastructure as evidenced in the massive amount of water wasted through the City’s aging pipe network. The international average for water wastage in infrastructure is 17%. Johannesburg’s water wastage is 42% of water purchased and this equates to wasted revenue of around R500million per year!
The other toxic side effect of Johannesburg’s Billing Crisis is evidenced by the state of the City’s liquidity position. It is in the National Treasury guidelines that municipalities should hold three months worth of cash cover in cash and cash instruments. DA controlled Cape Town meets this three month requirement by holding R6billion. According to Treasury Reports Johannesburg only has 0, 6 months worth of cash cover putting it in an extremely vulnerable position leading to higher Rates increases than Cape Town.
While I have indicated the toxic effects the Billing Crisis has visited upon the people of Johannesburg, the DA truly believes that these can be solved quickly, given the requisite professional focus and political will to ensure that the City’s collections are quickly and efficiently handled. Johannesburg has the highest level of outstanding debt of any Metro in the country at R12billion.
Work in Alexandra Ward 91
House Speaker Connie Bapela – City of Johannesburg with Cllr Andrew Stewart at a Johannesburg Roads Agency (JRA) function in Ward 91 (Alexandra) to unblock storm water drains.
JRA ran a large scale exercise in Ward 91 to clean blocked storm water drains on 1st and 2nd Avenue, Alexandra. Like most councillors, Cllr Andrew Stewart wishes that JRA would do this on a more regular basis. Blocked storm water drains cause the flooding of many homes in Alex, every rainy season.
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