Westville under siege – Part Two
Terence Pillay follows up on what has been done to curb the incredibly high crime rate in Westville.
Listen to today's show below, or read the contents under the podcast.
Last week I brought you the story of Westville, a community under siege from an alarmingly high crime rate. The residents, fed up with no intervention from the City, formed their own neighbourhood watches and other forums to address the issues.
But even the neighbourhood watch faced a barrage of bullets from robbers who were armed with AK47s – no match for a few men with just a green light in their cars.
Eventually, Deputy Mayor Fawzia Peer met with the community and promised that she would look into the matter, personally and urgently. Some of the solutions recommended were more cameras, more visible policing and a satellite police station to complement the SAPS, who are under-resourced.
One of the suggestions tabled was for the community to apply for an SRA or special rates area and under that, they could take control of some of their security issues. For example, the financial resources that become available through an SRA would allow them to put in additional cameras, and other measures.
The way it works in Durban is that they would have to get sixty-six percent buy-in with a minimum of a thousand households. And once you get that buy-in then every household is forced by law to pay additional rates. It works out to roughly two hundred rands a month extra per household.
They pay that money to the municipality and the municipality, in turn, pays that to a section 21, Not For Profit Company and that company manages the additional resources that the community wants to put in place. But it’s an administrative, red-tape nightmare trying to put this in place. The community asked the Deputy Mayor to speed up the process seeing as this was a special circumstance, and she didn’t even respond to that. And that was a constructive, community-based solution to the problem.
This week I chatted to Councillor Fawzia Peer to find out what progress was made on the City’s promises to the community at the meeting. I’m happy to announce that there have been significant changes to policing in Westville, with a more visible police presence, more cameras, and even a mounted patrol.
But even the neighbourhood watch faced a barrage of bullets from robbers who were armed with AK47s – no match for a few men with just a green light in their cars.
Eventually, Deputy Mayor Fawzia Peer met with the community and promised that she would look into the matter, personally and urgently. Some of the solutions recommended were more cameras, more visible policing and a satellite police station to complement the SAPS, who are under-resourced.
One of the suggestions tabled was for the community to apply for an SRA or special rates area and under that, they could take control of some of their security issues. For example, the financial resources that become available through an SRA would allow them to put in additional cameras, and other measures.
The way it works in Durban is that they would have to get sixty-six percent buy-in with a minimum of a thousand households. And once you get that buy-in then every household is forced by law to pay additional rates. It works out to roughly two hundred rands a month extra per household.
They pay that money to the municipality and the municipality, in turn, pays that to a section 21, Not For Profit Company and that company manages the additional resources that the community wants to put in place. But it’s an administrative, red-tape nightmare trying to put this in place. The community asked the Deputy Mayor to speed up the process seeing as this was a special circumstance, and she didn’t even respond to that. And that was a constructive, community-based solution to the problem.
This week I chatted to Councillor Fawzia Peer to find out what progress was made on the City’s promises to the community at the meeting. I’m happy to announce that there have been significant changes to policing in Westville, with a more visible police presence, more cameras, and even a mounted patrol.
At the end of the day, the question is what are the sustainable solutions to keeping a community safe and secure? Peer says this is a pilot project that she wants to roll out to the rest of Durban. She says the City is committed to fighting crime hard and making Durban a safe place to live in.
You can email Terence Pillay or follow him on Twitter: @terencepillay1 and engage with him there.