Leah Knott took over as the new councillor in Ward 89 after the recent municipal elections. Previously, Leah served as a councillor in Ward 97. She shared that although they are currently going through inductions as councillors, she has already begun engaging with residents.
“I have been driving around steadily, collecting information and engaging with residents, residents associations (RAs) and officials on prominent issues in the ward. The ward is probably more built up than most in the city so there is not much room for new capital projects. However, there are infrastructure concerns that need to be prioritised. I am working with the City Power planning department to allow residents to enclose mini-subs to protect them against vandalism and theft of fuses, as well as the refurbishing of mini-subs, which was a suggestion made by the Constantia Kloof RA under John Baisley.”
Regarding issues that need to be addressed immediately, Leah said this would include unresolved reinstatements, particularly by Joburg Water. “Joburg Water and JRA have attended to some serious ones or provided feedback on resolution,” she added. The next immediate concern on her to-do list is streetlight outages. She shared that some residents in Fairland offered to do block assessments where they live. Residents are to log outages and send the information to her, to add them to the ones already collected.
“Homelessness and building control problems are other concerns which need constant supervision and engagement with the City.”
The ward councillor describes herself as hands-on, committed and motivated to get things done. This extends beyond having experience in another ward. “I bring experience from a legal standpoint as well as from a planning perspective. It is sometimes difficult to get things done with the lack of resources and other factors within the City, but I like to adopt an innovative approach that allows for finding solutions which may not be conventional but are a result of collaboration between residents and officials.”
She acknowledged RAs that make it easier to fight issues in the ward and have been helpful.
“If there is one thing I shall do is focus more on policy which is one of the primary mandates of a councillor, but something we have been unable to get involved in effectively due to having to chase up service delivery failures on a constant basis, which is very time-consuming. I have also learnt a lot from being a councillor over the last five years so one vital fact I have picked up is to track issues that occur on a continuous basis, which helps councillors motivate for budget allocation when the time comes, as the City does not appear to have a tracking mechanism on maintenance and infrastructure failures.”
Leah can be contacted by sending an email to leahkn@joburg.org
