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uncollected garbage; illegal parking; broken street lights; missing street signsblocked street drains; tree/vegetation pruning/cutting; graffiti.
Municipal and other issues
📧 Submitting issues & suggestions
We do periodical inspections of the property, but sometimes things get neglected or break without us knowing about it. Please let the trustees know of any building issues (broken lights in the common property) or suggestions for improvements (adding a veggie garden, anyone?).
⚡️ Electricity & lighting issues
If there is no power outside scheduled , first check your electricity switch box — they are high on the cabinet wall in the kitchens (according to the original building plans; yours might be different), make sure yours didn’t trip.
If it’s out for the entire building, ask the trustees to check the electricity room switchboard.
If it is out for the entire neighbourhood, it’s a municipal issue, so please submit a with the City, it takes 2 minutes.
The lights in the common area passageways turn on when it’s dark (usually 6pm to 6am). These don’t work during load shedding.
We added solar-charged spot lights that will work during load shedding to the front and the back parking, but these appear to struggle to get fully charged in winter.
If any bulbs are broken, please report it to the trustees.
💧 Water issues
Each unit’s water cutoff valve is in the bathroom (according to the original building plans; yours might be different). If you have a burst pipe, geyser or similar issue in your unit, close this tap immediately. All warm water geysers are insured by the building — reach out to the trustees for more information.
If your unit, or the entire building is without water, please submit a with the City.
🎶 Noise issues
Many of Bagamoya’s residents work from home, others have infant children and all enjoy peace and quiet. Please be considerate with your noise levels; day and night. If you are planning on doing noisy maintenance or renovations (such as hammering or drilling), please notify the WhatsApp group early enough with a scheduled starting (and ending) time, so that everyone can plan their meetings accordingly.
As per the Bagamoya Conduct Rules, no noise is permitted between the hours of 22h00 and 08h00 on any day.
We’ve had issues with the Moveable Feast bar (formerly Rafiki’s) late at night. Werner (unit 10) has lodged complaints with the City, Law Enforcement, Cape Town Liquor Authority, and the owners of the bar, with some success. It . Werner and John Abel are in a WhatsApp group with the bar’s management and event organisers, and can escalate the matter if it becomes an issue again. If anyone is affected by this, please let us know.
⛔️ Problem buildings
Our neighbouring building, Park View Mansions, has been empty for over a decade, with a score of issues, including squatting. We initiated complaints and service requests with the City (abandoned buildings bylaws) and with our ward Councillor in Jan 2024. Work has been ticking along, stopping every few weeks. We keep communicating with the City about this.
🏢 Municipal issues
All tenants are encouraged to as soon as you become aware of them.
The more service requests that are sent, the more visibility there is on a problem, and the more budget and resources will be directed to our neighbourhood. It only takes a few minutes, and you can do so entirely online.
Things to report (but not limited to):
⛺️ Homelessness & squatting camps
There is a squatting problem, right on our doorstep (tents on Buitengracht street; others in Gardens and Bo-Kaap; the recently-closed Green Point "Tent City", and so on). It has been a massive headache to legally remove these encampments with eviction being a legal process that takes time.
(Update Aug 2024: Buitengracht street and large parts of the City have been cleared after the .)
It’s important to know that nobody can (or should, ever) be forcibly removed from their home. It's a constitutional right, regardless of if that home is a large mansion or a tent on the sidewalk. Permanently occupying a public space, however, is also not allowed, but this needs to follow a legal eviction process, not any other kind of forceful relocation.
Many neighbourhoods, like ours, are now focused on preventing the setting up of these temporary homes / encampments / street sleeping. That is: avoiding the setting up of tented areas now, before they are considered homes, to avoid the multi-month process of unhealthy and unsanitary conditions, and eviction later.
You are encouraged to report those setting up a street camp anywhere in Tamboerskloof, or sleeping on the sidewalks or parks (day or night), via a simple Whatsapp message to the CBAR Watchcom (+27214224222 — go ahead and save the number on your phone). They will send a patrol car and ask the individuals to move on.
Tamboerskloof has a good mobile response unit; you might have seen the white CBAR cars drive around. They prioritise callouts to their paying customers’ buildings/homes/alarms (Bagamoya isn't a member) but they also respond to other neighbourhood matters like this one.
Just a short message like: "Person sleeping in front of Bagamoya Flats, 3 Brunswick Road" (it helps to include a photo and a location pin/Google Maps link). They will send the callout vehicle (if/when available) and politely ask the person/people to move on.
It's fast, easy, not a strain on law enforcement, and from monitoring the past few months, very effective.
This might only temporarily move the problem elsewhere (probably less-resourced neighbourhoods like Bo-Kaap), but the City is massively expanding their Safe Space facilities in addition to the ~40 NGOs and shelters focused on providing dignified shelter and social services to help get people off the street.
😩 Electric gate & remotes issues
Please notify the trustees if you lost your blue gate remote for a replacement (at the owner’s cost). It poses a security risk to the other tenants — as anyone who picks up your keys and remote could walk through the neighbourhood to see which gates and doors they open. For this reason we will periodically reprogram all remotes, so that old missing ones won’t work anymore.
During load shedding, the electric gates run off a small battery, opening and closing a bit slower than normal.
Sometimes the gate has gotten stuck or non-responsive. Immediately notify in the WhatsApp group if it’s not working properly, so the trustees can try and resolve the matter. See .
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