EDITOR – In the Sun dated 21 July, am I not surprised that the former councillor Duncan Du Bois takes exception to the statement that the present ward 66 councillor Cllr Prinsloo has quoted “years of neglect are being reversed all over the Bluff,” and as such that the previous councillor was responsible for that neglect?
As far as I know, when a councillor is elected to represent a ward – in this case ward 66 – it is the elected councillor’s responsibility to oversee that all matters in his ward are attended to with regards to municipal affairs.
This includes roads and all matters that go with it such as signage, painting of various lines on roads, stop signs and especially speed calming humps, repairing of potholes, sweeping of streets in the ward and so on. Also to ensure that parks are kept tidy with grass cut. This includes off-cutting and trimming of all municipal verges, as well as ensuring that municipal rubbish bins are placed at strategic points, especially near schools and businesses. The councillor is also responsible for seeing that these bins are emptied timeously on a regular basis and if these things don’t get done, to address the issue with the relevant department on their shortfall, preferably in writing.
What is most important however is to follow-up in writing should a department not perform or reply timeously to one’s letter. To make a statement that one has written a letter in April but by October no reply has been received, nor has it been followed up begs the question: Why did you write the letter in the first place?.
The pole-type rubbish bin provided near the corner of Lighthouse and Island View roads and along Island View Road, which for years has been overflowing, eventually sagged to the ground due to its weight.
My letter in this newspaper of 16 September 2013 with the heading ‘Filth everywhere on the Bluff‘ with photos and the subsequent clean-up operations that ought to have taken place in October 2013 at the Fynnland area yielded basically only the raid by Metro and SA Police of the building opposite Fynnland station. The actual clean-up of the verges around Fynnland railway station area yielded nothing, thanks to about 16 municipal workers who were dropped off at about 9.15am that morning without any working gear such as pangas, spades, rakes and equipment, nor supervision. They were then picked up at about noon without doing a single spade of work.
One would expect in such a large, planned clean-up operation in one’s ward, that one would take an interest and witness such an operation yet the relevant councillor was nowhere to be seen in that area that day.
I admit a councillor has many other responsibilities other than those mentioned above. However, proof of years of neglect and the improvement or not thereof can be judged from some of my photos published in this paper in 2013. Compare such with a Google Map of 2015 (not much of a difference between the two years) and the stance as it is now. I no longer live on the Bluff but do visit such once or twice a month and to me it seems there has been a slight improvement since the new councillor took office. As the saying goes, a new broom sweeps cleaner. Time will tell.
In the upper highway area, the roads are maintained and the verges are trimmed along all residential roads at least once a month, even in winter, hence as to why residents take pride in their properties. It has nothing to do with rates but rather supervision and the will to want to do something.
NICK LE ROUX
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