Residents of Boksburg have raised concerns about the disused and neglected state-owned building located at the corner of Leeuwpoort and Bank streets, next to the traffic court.
The property in question was years ago used by the Department of Home Affairs, but the furniture and other contents have been gathering dust since the occupants left.
The Department of Public Works and Infrastructure has not yet responded to the Boksburg Advertiser’s request for information on the building. However, information gathered by the Advertiser suggests that ‘water-logging’ forced the Department of Home Affairs to vacate the building.
Ward 32 Clr Marius de Vos also expressed his concerns about the neglected property. He said during a recent meeting about their proposed project to restore the CBD to its former glory, this building formed part of their matters of concern.
“This empty building has been raking up a huge bill in guarding and security services for a substantial number of years.
“It is also not fit for human habitation due to rising water in the basement or foundation.
“The premises can be put to good use by knocking it down and creating parking or a park that can be utilised. All it does now is costing the taxpayers by having it guarded by private security firms.
“In my view, it boils down to wasteful and fruitless expenditure,” said de Vos.
The Advertiser understands that at some point after the offices left, some local NGOs requested to use the building, but their requests were declined.
One of these organisations is the Boksburg and East Rand Historical Association – which wanted to convert the building into a museum.
This property is among dozens of other state-owned disused buildings in Boksburg, which are attracting vagrants and property hijackers. They include some of the illegally occupied government houses on 14th and 15th Avenue in Boksburg North.
This story will be updated as soon as the relevant department responds to our lists of questions.
Some of the questions posed to the department include:
• What are the plans for the property and when are you planning to start implementing whatever plans you have?
• Why is the building being neglected or kept unused for all these years?
• Is the building secured or protected against intruders, vagrants or property hijackers, especially those who turn disused properties into drug dens and brothels?
• If guarded by a security company, how much money is spent on the service providers per year?
• Is the cost of safeguarding this empty building not constituting wasteful expenditure?
• Do you carry out a routine inspection of the property? If yes, what did the latest inspection reveal about the state of the building?
• Will the department consider converting the building and many others in the city, into something else or donate it to NGOs or small businesses or hand it over to the municipality to use, so that they would be well maintained?
• When was this building built, and for what purpose?
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