Roodepoort suburbs given a massive spruce-up

14 October 2015

 

Several Roodepoort suburbs in the City of Johannesburg’s Region C were given a new lease of life on Monday October 12 when members of an integrated team of municipal-owned entities swept into town and removed anything unsightly lying in their wake.

 

By the end of the day, trees in Ward 71 had been pruned, several streets had new road markings, litter from the local park had been removed and certain parts of the area fumigated for mosquitoes and rats.

 

By the time team members called it a day, scores of people had been – in line with Executive Mayor Cllr Parks Tau’s Go Jozi Healthy Lifestyle Programme – given free health tests for cholesterol, high blood pressure, diabetes, to name a few lifestyle diseases and conditions.

 

The campaign, conducted under Region C’s Integrated Community Outreach Programme (ICOP), started as early as 9am, with employees from entities and departments such as Johannesburg City Parks & Zoo, City Power, Pikitup, Johannesburg Metropolitan Police Department, Johannesburg Water and the Department of Health and Social Development combing the streets of Ward 71 to look out for service delivery breakdowns – replacing leaking water pipes, clearing blocked drains and fixing faulty or malfunctioning street lights.

 

The ward includes suburbs such as Princess, Grobblerpark, Lindhaven, Reefhaven, Witpoortjie, Culembeeck, Batavia and Davidsonville.

 

About 180 City employees were involved in the operation, coordinated by Ward Inspector Caroline Minie, Ward Commander Ronnie Segoale and Ward Councillor Gert Niemand. Minie explained that every month Region C conducted an ICOP in various wards and this time it was the turn of Ward 71. She said she was happy that the ward was “fairly clean”, with most of the roads having been tarred, among other interventions.

 

“But faulty street lights are still a problem. I’ve given Ward Commander Ronnie Segoale a list of defective street lights so he can liaise with City Power to attend to them as a matter of urgency,” said Minie.

 

Another challenge affecting service-delivery in the area was the theft of road signs, illegal electricity connections and sewer blockages in nearby Greenbeltspruit, especially in the wake of the mushrooming of informal settlements in the area.

Cllr Niemand said ICOP was one of the initiatives the City employed to “make a difference in the lives of the people of Johannesburg”.