AGM
PARRA is required in terms of our Constitution to have an Annual General Meeting no later than two months after the date of each financial year and not more than thirteen months between the date of one annual general meeting and the next. At these AGM’s the financial statements for the past financial year are considered, the Executive Committee Members are elected and any other matter of which due notice has been given in the notice convening the meeting.
See previous years AGM & Chairman Reports below:
AGM Minutes:
Port Alfred Ratepayers and Residents AGM 23rd March 2023 5.30 pm
- Welcome: L. Luppnow welcomed everyone. Business Forum and Sunshine Coast Tourism were especially welcomed as PARRA work in conjunction with these organisations.
- Apologies: L Guest, N & R Nell
- Financial Statement: M Roesstorff reported on the PARRA’S Financials. (See attached.)
- Chairperson’s Report: (See attached.)
- Vice Chairperson’s Report: (See attached.)
- Election of the Executive. The following members had been proposed and seconded according to PARRA’S constitution which required nominations to be sent to the Secretary 14 days in advance of the AGM. D van Wyk, L Luppnow, J van Wyk, B Rowlston, J Rice, R Mouton, M Hosty and M Roesstorff. It was proposed that representatives from Tourism and Business Forum attend Exco meeting so the 3 organisations do not overlap on projects.
- General: Questions were asked about indigent grants which D van Wyk explained were problematic as residents did not want to register as indigents as they were then not able to loan money. The NLM were working on the problem. There is no way of controlling the overuse of the indigent water and electricity allocation. R 117 500 000 is the amount NLM receives in equitable share from the Government. Questions were asked about the RO plants. D van Wyk replied that QFS reneged on their contractual agreement and the 2ML RO plant was closed while the dispute was resolved in court. Water extraction from the behind the Weir is problematic as the pumps are not maintained properly and this leads to insufficient pumping to PA. PARRA requested and succeeded in getting a dedicated pipeline installed from behind the Weir to the Sarel Haywood Dam. Date and times of budget meeting are advertised in various forums. Stone work grant used or not? D van Wyk replied that the grant was used to repair the Kowie river bank walls. Quarterly water samples from the river are published by NLM. Water testing of boreholes does not comply with SANS requirements. Rhodes University also do water testing on the Kowie river water.
- Closure.
D le R van Wyk
Signed PARRA Chairman
Minutes of the Annual General Meeting of the Port Alfred Ratepayers’ and Residents’ Association, on Monday 21st October 2019 at the Royal Marina Clubhouse at 5.00 for 5.30 pm
- Welcome: D van Wyk welcomed everyone and thanked them for their attendance.
- Attendance: See Register
- Apologies: R Ryan
- Confirmation of Previous Minutes: Proposed: R Hicks, Seconded: D Quenet.
- Matters arising from the minutes: None
- Chairman’s Report: See Attached
- Treasure’s Report: See Attached
- Talk by S Babama Deputy Director of Infrastructure Ndlambe Municipality. The Deputy Director spoke about Port Alfred’s water problems. Amatola Water are a big problem as the plant they are building to ‘sweeten the water’ is not functional. The Municipality are trying with resolve the issues with Amatola Water but the problem is the Government insist the Municipality use Amatola Water. Director Vithi to have a comprehensive Water plan in place by early 2020 with plans and a budget to solve Port Alfred’s water problems.
- Election of Office Bearers. The following people were nominated to stand for PARRA: D van Wyk, M Hosty, R Hicks, J van Wyk, D Quenet, D Hosty, C Crawford, C Oliver and R Oliver. S Venene seconded to PARRA.
- General: S Boucher raised the issue of the Small Boat Harbour and its lease and who is responsible for the removal of the sand banks. He and R Schenk then got into a rather lengthy discussion about the issues. D van Wyk then asked both of them to continue this discussion after the meeting. As no other issues were raised the meeting was closed.
- Closure: 18.30
D le R van Wyk
Signed PARRA Chairman
Minutes of the Annual General Meeting of the Port Alfred Ratepayers’ and Residents’ Association, on Monday 17th September 2018 at the Royal Marina Clubhouse at 5.00 for 5.30 pm
- Welcome: M Hosty welcomed all the residents who had made the effort to attend the AGM. He said that when he joined the PARRA Executive he soon realised that there was a lot of work done by the executive behind the scenes and he said the committee needed to be thanked for their work. M Hosty also stated that we live in a gem of a town which has a functional Municipality.
- Attendance: See Register
- Apologies: R Schenk, S Venene, C McKenzie, J & T van der Merwe,
- Confirmation of Previous Minutes: Proposed: R Hicks, Seconded: S Pool.
- Matters arising from the minutes: For Port Alfred to be on water borne sewerage a grant is needed which is pending.
- Chairman’s Report: See Attached
- Treasure’s Report: See Attached
- Talk by E Mouton Geohydrologist: “Have the Ndlambe Municipality built resilience into the bulk water supply?” E Mouton outlined where Ndlambe’s obtains its water from. He discussed the Sarel Hawood Dam which has problems, the beach boreholes which have run dry, and the pipes which require maintenance. There are numerous problems associated with water which were discussed. There is not much planning taking place for future development and population growth.
- Election of Office Bearers. The following people were nominated to stand for PARRA: D van Wyk, M Hosty, R Hicks, J van Wyk, D Quenet and R Oliver.
- General: N Johannsen asked what PARRA had done about the Ndlambe valuation Roll where there were plots valued at R1.00. D van Wyk explained that the roll was actually closed and was going to be re valued early 2019, when these issues could be addressed. The NRF had met with the Valuator and had numerous meeting with Mr Klaas. PARRA are well aware that there are issues with some valuations but PARRA will not support the targeting of individuals. The rates are paid in the mother erf until the plots were surveyed and or sold. R Hicks then intervened and told N Johannsen that he took issue with her accusations and demanded an apology. This was duly given. She continued to labour the point.
11. Two Resolutions were put to the AGM.
One that the PARRA subscription be a flat rate of R 50.00 per family.
Two that the AGM and the Financial Year End be moved to later in the year when the weather was warmer. Both these Resolutions were unanimously adopted.
- Closure: 18.45
D le R van Wyk
Signed PARRA Chairman 17th September 2018
Minutes of PARRA AGM held at Memorial Hall Port Alfred Thursday, 3rd August 2017
- Welcome: D van Wyk welcomed everyone present and thanked the Press for attending.
- Attendance: See register
- Apologies: P Kenard-Davis, Mr & Mrs McKenzie, R Alison, E & F Bradfield, J Wilson, J Ghee, P Allison & J Billing.
- Speaker – His Worship the Mayor Phindile Faxi: The Mayor said that because of the economic situation in the country we must all come together to help each other. Port Alfred needs to promote tourism to provide employment. The service delivery protests are about housing. The Mayor had written to the Minister of Human Settlements to assist. Badly built houses need to be fixed and new houses built. The biggest problem in Ndlambe is Bulk Water Supply. The Ndlambe area cannot develop without water. The Premier of the Eastern Cape came to Port Alfred to meet with the Mayor to try to address these two critical issues. 780 new houses will be built and the criteria for receiving a house will change. The destitute, the aged and child headed households will be the first to receive houses. The Mayor also said the Municipality was trying to resolve the Small Boat Harbour issue. The issue of stray animals causing accidents needed to be addressed.
- Confirmation of Minutes: AGM 15 August 2016. Proposed R Hicks. Seconded T Cockbain.
- Matters arising: None
- Chairman’s Report: See attachment
- Treasurer’s Report and Financial Statement: See attachment
- Nomination and Election of Members of the Executive Committee: The following Members were nominated, D van Wyk, J van Wyk, T van der Walt, R Hicks, S Poole, D Quenet and M Hosty.
- General Discussion: Ratepayers raised the issue of the flawed housing lists which created problems for residents waiting for houses. The issue was also raised that families receiving houses then rented them out to receive an income. It is apparent that the system of allocating housing is deeply problematic & the cause of tension among residents.
- Ward 10 Municipal Communication: G Galbraith on behalf of the Ward 10 War Room said that the new Municipal communication policy was not discussed with anyone and the War Room believe the policy is flawed.
- Closure: Meeting closed at 6.35
D le R van Wyk
Chairman Reports:
PARRA Chairman’s Report 2019
Good evening ladies and gentleman I have the pleasure of submitting the Chairman’s’ Report for this period. I would like to thank our Exco for all the hard work done during this period. We welcomed three new members to Exco, Scarra Venene, Ray Oliver and Boyce Xamesi.
Exco has been quite busy during this period and although we only have 7 members we have managed to get quite a few things done.
- Budget and IDP
Numerous meetings with NRF and the Municipality in an attempt to do away with the Directors “wish lists” has resulted in a budget that balanced and an acceptable increase to the Ndlambe ratepayers.
Item | Increase | Comment |
Property Rates | 5.2% = .0111 cents per Rand | Effective 7.2% with 2% adjustment for rebate |
Residents | ||
Water | 6.00% | Reduced from Amatola’s higher tariff |
Electricity | 13.07% | Fixed by Nersa and Eskom |
Sewerage | 6.00% | |
Salaries | 6.50% | |
Ndalmbe | ||
Electricity | 15.63% | Nersa and Eskom’s increase |
Water | 10% | Amatola’s increase |
Maintenance | Increased by 61% over 2018-19 | |
External Funding | R15m -36 months | 12% interest |
PARRA wrote a letter to the CFO and Municipal Manager about the massive debt write offs. No response was received.
PARRA wrote a letter to the CFO and Municipal Manager about the large amount of rate payers money budgeted (R 450,000) to be spent on a “Music Festival”. Ratepayer’s money should be spent on improving services which are badly needed like improving the roads, water and sewerage. No response was received.
PARRA has asked Ndlambe to make sure all indigents are registered so that the Municipality can get the maximum income from the “equitable share” from the government that they are entitled to.
- 2019 Valuation Roll
Numerous meetings were held with Valuators and the Municipality. Anomalies and incorrect calculations were pointed out and fixed by the Valuators. The Roll is still not a 100% but is a vast improvement on the previous Roll. PARRA have a copy of the Roll and if anyone wants to look at it and compare values I have an excel version that can be sorted. Unfortunately the data that has been captured is not done in a standard way and some entries start with Mr. some with a Surname and others with the initials. The Municipality needs to clean this up as it originates from the Ndlambe Accounts data base.
- Water
Ndlambe and specifically Port Alfred is a water SCARCE area. Although strict water restrictions are in place numerous residents either ignore them or are not aware of them. The Sarel Hayward Dam has no catchment area and is basically a reservoir that is normally fed from the weir at waters meeting. There is however no water flowing down the Kowie river into the weir and thus the dam is not being replenished. The east beach dunes water source has been revived and the only other sources of water are the boreholes in the central belt that are being over utilised. The capacity of the water treatment plant is not sufficient especially during the holiday season to supply Port Alfred with potable water. There are often problems in the balancing dam with algae and blocking of outlet to the water treatment plant. Numerous think tanks have been held to solve these problems and hopefully the situation will improve early next year.
- Sewerage
Most of Nemato is now on water borne sewerage but over 60% of the West Bank is not. The effluent from all these residences not on water borne sewerage is poisoning the ground water! Every year a grant is applied for to put the whole of Port Alfred on water borne sewerage but the funds are never forthcoming from government!
Port Alfred also has certain areas prone to sewerage leaks (Wharf Street Biscay Road and van der Riet Street) on a continuous basis and this never seems to be resolved by the Municipality.
- Ferryman’s Hotel
The owner Mr Klein agreed at meeting with the Municipality, Ward 10 Councillor, Ndlambe legal representative and the PARRA chairman promised to fix the front facades of the Annex and the Main Hotel. The Annex would be painted, burglar barred and broken windows by the middle of October. The Main Hotel’s facade would be painted and fixed by the middle of December
- Town Planning, rezoning and departure applications
The Ndlambe Planning Tribunal is now up and running. Applicants now have to prove that they have sent letters to all neighbours.
This is a problem as there is no other protocol in place to ensure neighbours are informed of proposed re-zoning or departure applications.
Notices are published in the press but only have Erf numbers not addresses.
PARRA has repeatedly asked for street names and house numbers to be included in the notices.
- General
PARRA has written numerous letters to the Municipal Manager during the year. Unfortunately not all received replies. Letters were mostly about stray cattle, the state of the small boat harbour, water leaks, sewage leaks, state of the sewerage works, East Beach ablutions, untidy overgrown pavements and storm water drains not being cleared. PARRA also wrote objection letters to the erection of Cellphone Mast within residential areas. PARRA also participated in Interested and Affected Party meetings to the applications for sand mining near the 43rd Air school. Generally the requests to clear overgrown pavements and clearing blocked storm water drains are met with a positive response and the drains and pavements are cleared.
- East Beach Ablutions
These remain an area of concern as they are being continuously vandalised. Mike Hosty from PARRA, Richard Heaney from the Board Riders together with the Municipality will meet to see if any solution can found.
Dawie van Wyk 21st October 2019
Port Alfred Ratepayers and Residents Annual Report for the year 2017/2018
Our committee was reduced during 2017-18 due the fact that Tim and Ruth Cockbaine decided that they have had a long innings and planned to do some travelling. PARRA wishes them well and thanks them for all the hard work they did over the years.
We are fortunate in Ndlambe that our Municipality is solvent, pays its Eskom and water bills and keeps our pavements reasonably clean. The cleaning up after major events like the New Year’s Day Festivities is to be commended.
IDP and Budget
The Integrated Development Plan is meant to be done in 5 year cycles and should be the template on which the budget is planned. If an item is not in the IDP it cannot appear in the budget. Ndlambe’s IDP in is not linked to the budget and is at best a copy and paste from the previous year. The budget starts as a wish list of what the Directors want to spend. The NRF through Chris Bezuidenhout and myself have had numerous meetings with the budget steering committee in an attempt to reduce the rates increase to treasury guidelines, (inflation rate) which Ndlambe tend to ignore.
Examples of excessive budget items in the 2018/19 budget
Casuals: R 3.6 million
Overtime: R 6.4 million
An FNB loan of R 20 million (with no indication of how the loan is to be repaid).
Uniforms: R 1.8 million (which includes corporate branded clothing for senior officials)
Computers and IT: R 5.7 million
Catering: R 1.0 million
Employee costs exceed 40% of the total budget.
Roads
We are destined to have pot holes in most of our roads. Did you see in the news that Mumbai is the most potholed city in the world? (Most of our small towns have the same problem). The filling of potholes and then putting a slurry seal over the whole road appears to be more successful, but this is expensive. Brick block paving is being done on certain busy streets every year but is limited to the grant money received from the Province.
Bulk Water Supply
There is no forward planning of where Ndlambe is going to source its water from when the current dams and boreholes are not able to supply its growing population.
Sewerage
Their appears to be no commitment to rectify the frequent sewerage spills in van der Riet Street, Masonic Road, Mentone Road and Campbell Street. The sewerage works is a nightmare with little or no security and raw sewage often spills directly into the Kowie River. The Municipality does not even inform the residents when there is sewerage pouring into the Kowie River.
Valuation Roll
There are numerous problems with this roll where erven are valued at R 1.00 particularly in developments and the actual value is contained in the mother erf. PARRA is of the opinion that when an erf is registered the value must accrue to that erf and not be contained in the mother erf. The capture of the valuation data is not done consequentially. Residents could be Mr Adams or Adams Mr. Currently it is impossible to sort the Names or Companies in the Roll. There are numerous properties with no value and no owner on the Valuation Roll. ID numbers are missing and a huge effort is required to clean up this Roll.
Building and Departure Applications
Many of the applications the Municipality receives are flawed and PARRA have worked to have this remedied. One such example being the Cell Phone Tower application which was technically and legally flawed and was eventually rejected after constant intervention from PARRA. When applications are received neighbour participation and consultation is often lacking. The Ndlambe Planning Tribunal has recently been constituted but the ratepayers have no representation on this council.
Interaction with the Municipality
There is constant interaction between PARRA and the Municipality who are always willing to listen. However the wheels grind slowly and implementation is slow.
Stray Animals
There have been numerous court cases where Ndlambe Management has been found to be in contempt of Court but there does not appear to be any political will to solve the problem. PARRA feels the time has come for those officials who are in contempt of Court to pay the legal fees in their personal capacity and not lumber the ratepayers through their inability to abide by theses court decisions.
Small Boat Harbour
This is meant to be the jewel of Port Alfred. Unfortunately it is poorly maintained and new management needs to be appointed if we actually want to save the jetties which are dangerous, unstable and are in dire need of repair.
R72 and SANRAL
This appears to be a never ending saga. The poor traffic control by the contractors is very slap dash and has led to numerous accidents. The Municipality does not appear to have much input into the health and safety issues that are disregarded by the contractors on a daily basis.
I would like to thank all our committee members for the time in hard work they put into PARRA. I would also like to thank the Royal Marina for the use of their clubhouse.
D le R van Wyk September 2018
