In a continued effort to clean up the city, Mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis, accompanied by Deputy Mayor Eddie Andrews and ward councillors from the surrounding areas hosted a beach clean up at Strandfontein on Saturday 12 March.
Launched in Mitchell’s Plain Town Centre in February, the campaign aims to encourage locals to take pride in their spaces, by getting involved in cleaning up dumping and litter (“Mayor gets dirty for city”, People’s Post, 8 February).
This is one of his first city-wide campaigns since his election.
Hill-Lewis said at the time cleaning up the city was everyone’s responsibility.
“Over the course of the next couple of months, I invite every Capetonian to join me on this campaign in various parts of our beautiful city and to play their part too to ‘Keep Cape Town Clean Together’,” he said at the time.
Clean-up initiatives have already been held in other parts of the city, with residents lending a hand.
“I visited the pavilion during my mayoral campaign and was shocked to see how it has deteriorated,” Hill-Lewis said. “There is so much potential for Strandfontein Pavilion.”
In all, R2 million has been allocated for the planning phase of the rebuilding of the pavilion in the January Adjustment budget, he continues, with R40 million allocated to the development in the new financial year.
At the launch Hill-Lewis said the state of litter and dumping in the city is of huge concern, with tens of thousands of staff needed to clear it, an undertaking the City was unable to take.
A total of R5 million has been allocated to the campaign.
“Residents deserve clean communities and I hope that with a consistent education campaign we can turn the tide and change behaviour,” he said at the launch.
More than 180 000 tons of waste is cleared annually from illegal dumping hot spots city-wide. Illegal dumping costs the City more than R300 million, and this is why a sustained focus on changing behaviour is so vital, Hill-Lewis said.
He said Cape Town is known or its scenic coastline, boasting Blue Flag beaches, including Strandfontein.
Despite daily beach clean-ups, up in the dunes plastic items, such as bottles, and also discarded face masks were found.
“It is important that we all play our part in keeping our public spaces clean,” Hill-Lewis said. “Last month we launched a major city-wide Clean-Up Campaign and have run clean-up operations in several communities over recent weeks. Our hope is that residents take joint responsibility for the cleanliness of our city.”
