KLEINMOND - The replacing of old water pipes in Hangklip/Kleinmond is to become the primary municipal infrastructure program in the area. A third plumbing team will also be added to the existing two teams that have been struggling to keep up with the large number of pipe breaks in particularly Betty’s Bay. In addition, a focus group of resident engineers and other experts is to be formed under the leadership of speaker Grant Cohen to advise and guide the municipality on the process of replacing the ageing water pipe infrastructure in the area. (<strong>Ed</strong>: <em>The Municipal Manager, Dean O’Neil was however quick to point out that the municipality would not necessarily follow all their recommendations</em>). These are some of the most important outcomes of a meeting between the Mayor, municipal officials, local councillors, ratepayers organisations and ward committee members held in the Kleinmond Town Hall on Tuesday afternoon. The meeting follows some serious criticism of the Municipality on particularly social media for frequently leaving businesses and homes in the area without water for up to 24 hours at a time. The meeting started with the Mayor taking a couple of swipes at the Overstrand Herald for our municipal reporting (<strong>Ed</strong>: <em>which shows we’re doing our job and that she reads us. Excellent!</em>). Mayor Rabie then quickly employed her usual no nonsense approach to determine the actual problem. Was it the pipes or were there management issues? Both the area manager, Desmond Lakey and operations manager, Denovan van Rhodie had to do some explaining. (<strong>Ed:</strong> <em>Jokes aside, the Mayor is actually brilliant at this. Engaging, complimentary, even funny at times. She literally had everybody around the table straining to help her solve her problem</em>). What is her problem? She has a very vocal group of residents (particularly in Betty’s Bay) who are totally fed-up with the continuous pipe breaks that leave their businesses and homes without water for long periods of time. She also has some 148km of old piping in the four towns that need replacing and she hasn’t got the money for it. (<strong>Ed</strong>: <em>Nothing seems to have been done about this for years, which of course is not our new Mayor's fault. She only arrived on the scene five months ago. One can’t however help but ask what became of the water infrastructure levies we pay so diligently every month and who is responsible for planning in our municipality).</em> Whatever the case, Rabie quickly got to the heart of the matter. The problem is actually a combination of old piping that simply can’t take the strain anymore and management and labour issues. Operations Manager, Denovan van Rhodie said his two plumbing teams simply could not keep up anymore. They often had to work through the night and under difficult conditions, such as in dense vegetation in certain areas of Betty’s Bay. They also only had one digger loader to do the job. There was general consensus in the meeting that this had to be rectified. The Municipal Manager said he had already signed off on an additional plumber and the Mayor indicated that an additional team would be put together. They would also look at the logistics to ensure that the correct piping and equipment was available at the municipal stores in Kleinmond at all times. Ward 10 councillor Theresa Els pointed out that there was also a problem with residents not following the correct channels when reporting a problem, while PR councillor Stephan Williams said there could also be better co-ordination between Veolia (the municipality’s contractor) and municipal teams. Dr Rabie told the meeting that to date some 26% of old pipes in Hangklip/Kleinmond have been replaced but that more than 140km of old piping remains. This includes 6 kms in Rooiels, 32kms of old piping in Pringle Bay, 46kms in Betty’s Bay and most of it, 63kms, in Kleinmond. At a rate of R1,95m per kilometre it would cost the municipality R228 million to replace all the old pipes. She said in terms of the draft budget she only had R29m for the whole of the Overstrand. Mayor Rabie said the problems were acerbated by legal issues on a national level around the awarding of tenders as well as the fact that Municipal Infrastructure Grants (MIG) funding took around three years to process. “This is why I need your collective wisdom. We will have to come up with a way to manage this dilemma,” she told the meeting. Municipal Director of Infrastructure, Stephen Muller said the only solution was to replace the old pipes. He estimated water losses at the moment to be in the region of 50% (<strong>Ed</strong>: <em>which is actually schocking. Think about it. We are losing half our water due to leakages and pipe breaks)</em>. Muller said the present pipes were not the right size and the original design inadequate. Added to this, new building plans in the area had escalated dramatically, he said. Rabie then asked an important question: Should we allow further densification of the area while we have water and electricity problems? Some representatives from the various ratepayers organisations felt that there should be a freeze on all building projects. Their argument was that we were simply creating a bigger problem for ourselves. Pringle Bay Ratepayers said they felt certain projects should be stopped and that the money should be put in one pile and directed towards solving the water pipe problem. Others said aging infrastructure was the problem, not development. Dr Rabie responded by saying that they could not take away people’s right to develop their properties but that she felt that the municipality should be stricter when it came to subdivisions and densification and that we should not extend the urban edge. She concluded that we needed to start somewhere. “Let’s fix Rooiels and then decide where to go. Betty’s Bay is really a hot spot.” <strong>Ed</strong>: <em>Last week the Herald was booted out of the social compact meeting in Hermanus on the recommendation of our esteemed Mayor. This week we were refused permission to attend the above meeting. We attended anyway as we felt it was in the public interest and the public thus had a right to know. We will continue to do so. </em>
