The City of Cape Town is making a lot of progress in Pelican Park and this morning, as part of the Mayoral Pop-Up Office initiative, I visited the area along with Cllr Gerry Gordon and Council Chief Whip, Cllr Shaun August.
Over the last few months we have worked to improve communication with residents by taking local government to communities through the Mayoral Pop-Up Office.
This to ensure that our residents have a platform where they can share their concerns about service delivery, as well as their ideas on how the City can improve services to the community.
Through this innovative concept, we are also able to provide Capetonians with information on services and give updates on projects in their communities.
We started our day with a visit to the Tehillah Educare Centre in Seawinds where we donated a geyser to the facility and visited beneficiaries of the Pelican Park housing development.
This morning we also took the opportunity to visit the proposed site of Phase 2 of the Pelican Park housing development which is to benefit more than 2 300 residents.
The City has already appointed a professional team of consultants for the project which will deliver approximately 2 330 state-subsidised, GAP and market-related houses.
Phase 2 housing will be in addition to the 2 013 State-subsidised homes the City has already delivered to residents in Pelican Park over the last five years. We have since also handed over more than 900 title deeds to new homeowners.
In addition, I made a stop at the site of the clinic in Pelican Park where the City has invested R46 million for the construction of the new facility. The clinic will be completed later this year.
The facility will provide a full basket of services to residents of Pelican Park, Lotus River and surrounds once it is operational.
Cllr Gordon, working with the subcouncil and City officials, has been at the coalface of service delivery in ward 67 and led a work readiness training programme for 60 young people from the ward in the previous financial year. More funds have been set aside for the programme to ensure that other youth continue to benefit in the 2018/19 financial year.
The Pop-Up Office is one of the Mayor’s Office’s new initiatives to make government more accessible, responsive, and I believe it is always vital to engage with residents about the City’s services face-to-face.
The City’s Organisational Development and Transformation Plan’s (ODTP) goal of building a customer-centric administration that is responsive to the needs of our residents is realised through the Mayoral Pop-Up Office.
Today it was enlightening to meet a resident who was among the first 100 beneficiaries of the Pelican Park housing development five years ago. Mrs Gwendelen Clarke moved into her home in 2013 after spending years living in a backyard with her husband and their children.
Mr Ronnie Adams, who lives with his daughter, took ownership of his house in Pelican Park two years ago. Mr Adams, originally from Hanover Park, is pleased that he was finally off the housing waiting list and has his own home.
Our interaction with residents does not end with the Pop-Up Office and I would like to encourage residents to keep connecting with their area-based Mayco members, ward councillors and subcouncil offices on a regular basis so that they can be informed of developments in their wards and work with us to build safe and inclusive communities.
Since kicking off the Mayoral Pop-Up Office two months ago, we have visited six communities and dealt with more than 100 individual complaints ranging from housing queries to water billing and refuse collection.
In one instance, following our engagement in Athlone, illegal dumping was removed immediately. The City also ordered additional refuse bins for a block of flats in Kewtown and we have resolved a payment issue for EPWP workers stationed in the area.
In Masiphumelele, where residents mostly raised issues around a lack of housing, the City has conducted a two-day registration drive in the community. More than 800 people were registered during that campaign.
We have taken this concept to Eerste River, Khayelitsha and Albow Gardens and will visit even more areas in the coming weeks as part of our commitment to ensuring the best quality of service for all residents of this great city.