Bringing the City closer to people
MAYOR Geordin Hill-Lewis, with his mayoral committee, met at the Cravenby Civic Centre yesterday to bring the City closer to the people.
The virement (the process of transferring items from one financial account to another) of funds on the 2021/2022 capital budget was requested for approval and related to delays in the Baden Powell project caused by the non-responsiveness of the National Department of Water Affairs, Hill-Lewis said.
The City’s R162 million Baden Powell Drive Bulk Water Pipeline Project is aimed at strengthening supply to Khayelitsha residents, with the new infrastructure expected to be commissioned around March next year.
Mayco member for Water and Waste, Zahid Badroodien, said: “Another virement, moving funds from a different project to another as a result of the issues that you’ve identified is an unavoidable request in this instance, but a necessary move for the directorate.”
Approval for the three-year agreement for hosting of the Cape Town Open Golf Tournament from 2022 was agreed on.
Hill-Lewis reiterated concerns over the low levels of capital expenditure performance across almost all of the departments.
Hill-Lewis said: “In January, we will be holding one-on-one sessions to take a detailed look at each department’s capital projects, project-by-project, and I’ll get my office to schedule those, but I’ve asked the team to be very familiar with the performance and all of those capital projects.
“I’ve also said that in future we will measure performance against main budget commitments and that applies to the executive and to the mayco.
“We’ll measure performance against main budget, not adjusted commitments. I think that is an important step in the right direction.”
Mayco member for Finance, Siseko Mbandezi, said: “We want to emphasise your sentiment over the very low capital expenditure in the first quarter of this financial year and that the respective departments prevent the expenditure because we are going to monitor it quarterly.”
Mayco member for Urban Management, Grant Twigg, requested support for informal traders, with Hill-Lewis in support.