TWO Durban ratepayers’ organisations have joined forces against eThekwini Municipality over the proposed tariff increases which they view as equivalent to placing an “unjustified burden on residents” by the City.
The Westville and Bluff ratepayer groups are threatening legal action against the municipality and at the heart of the dispute are the steep tariff increases. This is compounded by a public engagement on the process that the ratepayers believed was flawed or reduced to a “cynical tick-box exercise” that has resulted in their concerns not being taken seriously.
Public engagement is a legal process that municipalities must undertake to canvass the views of its ratepayers before implementing a new budget. The public participation process was set to end this past Friday.
The associations have written a letter to the City to complain about the tariff increases, saying the municipality did not seem to take into account the litany of service delivery failures that residents have raised.
Westville Ratepayers’ Association chairperson Asad Gaffar confirmed the authenticity of the letter.
“We hereby notify the City that should the City not afford the ratepayers a platform to fully engage and discuss this draft proposal to provide sufficient justification for a tariff increase based on financial and supporting evidence, considering a reciprocal duty of performance, we will have no option but to reject this increase and are willing to approach a court to seek remedy and will also ask the court for a cost order against the municipality,” read the letter.
The draft budget of about R66 billion for the 2023/24 financial year makes a series of proposals which will form part of the billing structure at the start of the financial year on July 1. The budget includes the following proposed tariff increases:
- Property rates: 8.9% increase on average.
- Water: 14.9% residential and 15.9% for business.
- Sanitation: 11.9% for residential and 12.9% for business.
- Electricity: 21.91% increase for all, subject to approval from the National Energy Regulator of SA.
- Refuse: 8% for domestic and 7%-9% for sundry and business.
In the scathing letter, the ratepayers also raised a number of irregularities with the public participation process for the budget.
Among the issues raised was the “short time” which they had to scrutinise the budget. They said the draft budget was released mid-April, with the deadline at the end of April.
“This is, in our view, not sufficient time for us, or any ratepayer, to adequately and thoroughly, scrutinise the budget and the reasons provided for the astronomical increase in the tariffs, considering ratepayers may not have sufficient knowledge in reading financial budgets,” said the letter.
“The Integrated Development Plan (IDP) presented for this budgetary increase talks mostly about the needs of the City without considering the needs of the ratepayers or their affordability in accommodating these increases.
“There was no evidence in the IDP presentations that the lack of service delivery experienced by ratepayers throughout the city was considered,” it said.
It described the process as flawed, pointing out that the public engagement process was a mere “tick-box exercise with no intention of considering the concerns raised by the ratepayers”.
“This submission is evidenced by the poor communication advertising the event. We only became aware of this through a community WhatsApp group on the 2nd May 2023,” said the letter, adding that it had seen no official public notice about the meeting and neither was there any public meeting that took place in Westville.
“We acknowledge that an IDP meeting was held in Austerville. We note that several objections were raised at this event, and the community was visibly distraught at the proposal of the astronomical tariff hikes
“The feedback from our ratepayers is that they do not see the justification for the proposed tariff hikes if measured against the current levels of service delivery,” said the letter.
It also listed a number of service delivery challenges they say calls into question the tariffs being charged compared to the services ratepayers received.
The City’s Legal Unit said they were aware of the letter.
Mayoral spokesperson Mluleki Mntungwa said: “We have met with the residents, but the mayor, Mxolisi Kaunda, will engage with all the ratepayers from across eThekwini, probably by next week.”