DEAR Editor,-
My wife and I would like to congratulate Shona Aylward on her excellent exposure of the deterioration of our beautiful South Coast, which The Herald highlighted over the last couple of weeks. We have lived on the coast for the past ten years and tear our hair out sometimes at the poor standard of workmanship, lack of supervision, excuses and unwillingness to accept responsibility.
When Max Mbili and DD Naidoo took over the reins of the two top positions we all had high hopes of things to come. Sadly, in both cases the jobs have been greater than the men. Bogged down by poor top management teams, unions and poor work ethics of their staff, they have succumbed to the system.
Years ago in Durban, where I resided for many years, it was always the meter readers who called monthly to read meters as the eyes and ears of the council. During their rounds they could report on roads needing repair, illegal building undertakings, water leaks, rubbish on verges, and so on. Sadly, we do not even have meter readers any more to perform this function.
It is also true that the average householder, not all, take very little pride in their surrounds and verges. We do have many holiday homes that are not occupied and can fall into disrepair and the state of the economy is also a factor for the lack of upkeep. Regrettably too many residents leave their rubbish, tree off-cuts and general garden refuse lying on verges or thrown over neighbours’ walls , or dumped on vacant stands. Again the council refuses to collect any garden or other refuse that is not in black bags on refuse day. Surely a collection could be done for garden or other refuse on a separate day? This could be turned into compost and sold back to ratepayers to defray costs.
We are all tired of trying to help and advise the new regime, address councillors, get involved in ratepayer associations and generally assist. It is no wonder frustrations are running high, we are fed up with paying more and more rates and taxes and getting less for our hard-earned rand.
One of the greatest strengths of good leadership is to accept constructive criticism and feedback. Keep up the good work Shona, you have our full support in all that you are doing by keeping this problem in the public eye and hopefully it pricks everyone’s consciences into doing better.
THE SCOTTS
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