#Letter: Value and protect our open spaces

Ken Lever of Ballito writes:

Your lead article on November 18 and the concerns raised in your editor’s Perspective column of the same date relating to the proposed Townsend Park sale for the purpose of constructing a mosque, has reference.

Sitting back and expecting our weekly newspaper and social media comments to sort out the problem just won’t work.

We have to stand up and be counted. We have until December 15 to record our objections to the selling of our park to a private organisation, not even represented here on the Dolphin Coast, much less present.

I note the support for selling Butterfly Park to the Zululand Islamic Society from a Stanger resident, and that he has pulled out the race and religious cards. I assume he believes the municipality is obliged to find land for the society – why?

Every other religious organisation in the greater Ballito area has had to source their own land or accommodation with their own resources on the open market – just like everyone else.

The whole point of the objection is not religious, but of losing a valuable and scarce public open space. Townsend Park was donated in 1962 to the residents of Ballitoville by the Townsend family and held in trust by the government of the day.

It was transferred from national and provincial registration to local authority custody when KDM was formed in recent years. The park is owned by the people of Ballito and the Dolphin Coast and simply held in trust by our municipality.

We need to value, look after, nurture, and protect our public open spaces and parks, for surely once they are gone they cannot be replaced.

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