Welcome to the April version of the Blackheath City Improvement District Newsletter.  April has again been filled with challenges, not just nationally, with strikes and political uncertainty sending the Rand into a downward spiral and soaring fuel prices, but also locally with other labour challenges, crime, service delivery issues and general littering featuring high on our list of concerns here in Blackheath Industria.

There has also been much good news for the local area.  Again in April 2014 Blackheath is bragging with several new developments.  Most notably is the Growthpoint Development in School Road.  Growthpoint is developing 4 Warehousing units with office space ranging from 2300m2 to 4000m2 on the corner of School and Range Roads that will see the “completion” of School Road to a very, very high standard by the 01^st of December 2014. Continue reading

Over the past month we managed to make progress with the verge on corner of Wimbledon and School Road.

We are ensuring that we give attention to every intersection in the area and will complete and then maintain it on a weekly basis.

Weeds will always be one of the problems we will have in the area.  The BCID cleansing staff has begun a de-weeding project ensuring that we do not have weeds that stand almost a meter high and growing through every nook and cranny.  Weeds and thorn bushes are growing right throughout the area and are not something that is easy to get rid of.  Our cleansing staff have been on the road every day to get their hands dirty and deal with litter and overgrown verges.

Streets are being swept on a daily basis.  Over these next few weeks we will start mowing verges again and we would like to send out a request to all business owners to just please keep the section around your property in a good condition.  Just by doing that it will help us a lot as we do not have the man power or equipment to mow and maintain every verge and do litter picking.

Before	After
Grass Growing over Sidewalk in Gooderson Street
Before	After
Sand laying in Rand Road and on sidewalk

Over the month of April we have seen a lot of development taking place at various locations through the area.  Growthpoint properties started with their new development on corner of Range and School Road.  Development of the Busmark 2000 site is coming to an end and will be fully functional in the next few weeks. Also have development happening in Warrior Crescent, as Greymo Construction is busy working their fingers to the bone to finish the site.

The are two Early Childhood Development Centres in Happy valley that the Blackheath City Improvement District supports and tries to aid as best we can, but we won’t be able to be successful without your assistance.  Any form of donation i.e. pens, pencils, erasers, old story books, etc. are always welcome and all we ask for.  We try our best to help out where we can, but we can only do so much.  So if there is anything you have available or are able to gather around your office then please let me know at mark@bcid.co.za .

If you want to keep up-to-date with what is happening at the schools we do weekly updates on the Facebook pages.  So visit https://www.facebook.com/AphilayoAmanzi to see what is happening at the Grade R School (run and supported by Sing for Africa) or https://www.facebook.com/pages/Happy-Feet-Cr%C3%A8che/160881017258062 to keep in touch with the youngsters at the crèche who are fun-loving and filled with child-like wonder.

The schools in Happy valley that the Blackheath City Improvement District support and tries to aid as best we can, but we won’t be able to be successful without your assistance.  Any form of donation i.e. pens, pencils, erasers, old story books, etc. are always welcome and all we ask for.  We try our best to help out where we can, but we can only do so much.  So if there is anything you have available or are able to gather around your office then please let me know at mark@bcid.co.za .

If you want to keep up-to-date with what is happening at the schools we do weekly updates on the Facebook pages.  So visit https://www.facebook.com/AphilayoAmanzi to see what is happening at the Grade R School (run and supported by Sing for Africa) or https://www.facebook.com/pages/Happy-Feet-Cr%C3%A8che/160881017258062 to keep in touch with the youngsters at the crèche who are fun-loving and filled with child-like wonder.

The Old MacAdams property on corner of Range and School Road was sold to Growthpoint Properties.  This property will be developed into a Small Business Park (Range Industrial Park) and units will be sized from 2300m2 to 4500m2.  Tise development will start during April with the completion date set for the 1^st of December 2014.

The BCID cleansing team ensured that they pushed their brooms through every street in Blackheath during March and managed to do that very effectively.

Cleansing and street sweeping is what staff are doing on daily basis.  During the month we shifted our focus a little and did more verge upgrades as we would like to make a visible and noticeable difference in the area.

In addition to the routine cleansing and street sweeping our team carry out some verge mowing projects and attend to regular spillages of sand and stone and even paint on occasion within the Blackheath Industrial area.

BCID men cleaning on corner of Wimbledon and School Road as truck spilled a load of sand in the road.

Verge Upgrades

Verge upgrades are taking place on the corner of Range/Anfield Roads and Wimbledon/School Roads. These are the two that we will focus on right now and will be attending to the others over the course of the year.

Verge upgrades will take place right throughout the year, and with the involvement of local businesses we will be able to do some extra work. So let’s put our hands together and make sure that Blackheath Industria is an industrial area we can feel proud of.

Service delivery from our local South African Police Services office at the Blue Downs court is at an all-time low.  Not that this is a surprise, but considering how bad the service has been over the last eight years, it could be getting even worse as a result of a lack of staffing.  Several of the members of management who have attempted to serve us well over the last 8 years have literally thrown in the towel.  I think the pressure and over commitment of their time and personal resources and the effect of the disturbing and sometimes very violent crime in the Mfuleni and Westbank areas that we share resources with have taken their toll and now we can only hope that the SAPS finds a speedy resolve to filling vacancies and dealing with staffing and resource issues at the local station.

Coupled to this is the ongoing lack of reporting of crime by locals and local businesses.  Please report all incidents of crime and attempted crime to the SAPS so that we can attract further resources to our cause.  The SAPS respond to crime statistics in allocating resources and if we continue to show low levels of crime, will continue to make it appear that we do not have a problem in the Blackheath area and that we are receiving adequate levels of service delivery from them, and this is NOT the case.  Not even close!

Then of course there are the gang issues, organised crime and a staggering 22 attempted murder cases in a matter of a month within the neighbouring residential areas in March that further consume SAPS resources. Continue reading