MISTY CLIFFS VILLAGE ASSOCIATION NEWSLETTER - May 2006
Editor: Tim Anderson

IT'S going on for half way through the year and your dilatory compiler has waxed late in putting pen to paper or, more precisely, fingers to keyboard. Fortunately, no one is ever interested in explanations or excuses so none is offered (but you don't know what scurrilosities you've missed!).

Committee stuff
We have some good news in that your committee has been galvanized out of its torpor by two new members, Schalk Visser (Erf 68) and Richard Court (38/39). Schalk is a disillusioned architect who finds it more fun to grow grapes near Stellenbosch. Richard fights an unequal battle against Eskom in promoting clockwork driven generators in consumer electrical goods. For sheer diversity of weird pursuits it would be hard to beat our Misty community.

We're sorry to have had Anni Lehr and Jeanne Maritz leave our action team, reputedly because of competing and often unpredictable domestic priorities. Among other contributions these lovely ladies made, their mere presence elevated the decency of our deliberations. As reported at the AGM Brian Marsh decided not to stand for re-election and we thank him for his valued advice and substantial contribution on many fronts over the past three years. His professional advice on many fronts will be missed.

Transparency's all the rage these days and in our PC style we'd like to say that anyone who'd care to attend one of our committee meetings would be most welcome. Just let one of the members know at least a week ahead so that the catering can be revised as all meetings include food and drink provided by the host. Meetings are scheduled for June 22, August 24, October 26, December 14, and in 2007 for January 25, February 22 and April 1 (AGM).

The following portfolios have been agreed for the coming year:

Treasurer: Lyn Mossop - 021-780-1178
Building: Schalk Visser - 021-881-3024
Environment, road maintenance & newsletter: Tim Anderson - 021-674-2834
Special Area status. New legislation, baboons and website: Richard Court - 083-376-9933
Monitoring and maintenance of existing legislation, and community matters: Leon Morris - 021-780-1256
Secretarial: Tim Anderson (minutes) - 021-674-2834 - and Doug Tunbridge (member communication) - 021-786-3842

Please feel free to contact them direct on any matters relating to their portfolios.

Baboons
Our cousins (to most of us) and brethren (possibly to a few of us) deserve being mentioned first because they've lately been creating havoc in Scarborough and thereby becoming bolder and smarter and much more of a problem. The reason is that the ongoing vexations of funding and managing baboon monitors had regressed to the point where the monitors were no longer supervised and didn't do their job.

Intensive work by Graham Noble of the Scarborough Ratepayers' Association has now midwifed a definitive new plan which seems reasonably certain of successful implementation. It puts the Baboon Management Team (BMT) onto a firmer basis and with qualified leadership. The BMT is an association of authorities and civil society which provides monitors and is/will be funded by the City of Cape Town, SANParks, and the local public. Some short-term official funding has been provided as a Poverty Relief project administered by Cape Nature.

A budget has been drawn up and the public contribution will be spread pro rata between Scarborough, Misty Cliffs, Kommetjie/Ocean View, Tokai, Welcome Glen and Miller's Point. Jenni Trethowan, knowledgeable about baboons and experienced in managing them, has been appointed as BMT Field Manager.

The mooted plan includes training of monitors, public education, and a protocol for treatment of sick or injured baboons. The City has undertaken to improve refuse collection so that baboon proofing is effective. It is important to understand that the objective of the BMT is not to keep baboons away but to facilitate their harmonious co-existence with human beings.

Richard Court will be communicating with you shortly to advise you of the plans which are now well advanced. Contributions will be made by City of Cape Town [R10 000], SANParks [R10 000], Kommetjie/Ocean View [R6 025], Welcome Glen/Millers Point [R6,025], Tokai [R6,025], Scarborough [R4,820] and Misty Cliffs [R1 205] - our contribution amounts to only 2.7 per cent.

It looks like a contribution of R50 per month or R600 per annum from each owner will put us in a position to control and protect the baboons. We will control all contributions from Misty owners through the Misty Cliffs Village Association and ensure that the fund is used to protect our village.

We remind you that Jenni Trethowan (783-3882) takes groups of people on "baboon walks". Her knowledge of these unreasonably maligned creatures is extremely interesting. So long as no one's carrying a bag that looks like it might contain food, baboons can be approached closely and studied - they ignore the visitors.

Trash management
An intensely annoying aspect of the baboon problem is that so many of us owners greatly aggravate the situation by persistently leaving our trash accessible to the animals who consequently strew it all over the place and thereby cause a health hazard, not to mention the lousy visual impact. The consequence is that baboons naturally will hang around our houses waiting to be fed trash or to sneak through a quickly-spotted open door.

There is a weekly (early Tuesday mornings) municipal trash collection service but it is PICK-UP (bags in bins) and not CLEAN-UP! The committee regularly engages an otherwise job-less labourer to clear natural detritus from storm water channels and catchpits, and the man will also collect manageable builders' junk - cement bags etc, but he is specifically instructed NOT to collect rotting maggoty garbage and other household trash.

The worst offenders in leaving trash are tenants or absentee owners' friends. Will you please make sure that trash management is a condition of use! People who come just for a weekend can easily take their trash home. It must not be left outside in a plastic bag.

We acknowledge that some of the supposedly baboon-proof dustbins are NOT. The popular kind with snap handles are instantly opened by baboons. The handles need to be chained tightly together and the ends of the chain joined with a brass or galvanized spring/screw hook - available in any boating shop and in some hardware stores.

Small dustbins get thrown around bodily by baboons, especially if they can't instantly open them. Bins may then burst open. The best solution is a municipal wheelie bin with a hinged lid. Among other possible sources they are available from Plastics for Africa (551-5790) at R465 for the black ones and R485 for coloured ones. It's very easy to fit a hasp and staple with a spring catch (as above) to keep the lid down. You can also rope or chain these bins by their handles to something immovable so that they can't be dragged away.

Leon Morris has established that baboon proof bins are available from Mica Hardware in Valleyland and Fish Hoek. A Mr van Til has confirmed to Leon that the bins are always available. If for some reason they are out of stock they will make them available within 24 hours, as they do the fitting of the chains themselves (suggest you have four chains fitted). Leon suggests those wanting bins phone van Til or Patrick Thorne on 782-1131 to establish if stock is available or to place an order to make one made up. They are also available on cenmic@iafrica.com.

Environment
One of the areas worst affected by alien vegetation was a section of the municipality's own road reserve, and this has now been cleared. We're experiencing an early onset of winter rain so the fire hazard has receded and the cooler weather will inhibit growth for a while. Weather records indicate that early rains usually precede a prolonged dry period, but recent patterns seem to confirm that the climate is becoming as feckless as the Unicity Council.

The steady increase in house-building will lead to increasing run-off from roofs and driveways. Building activity along the northern leg of upper Old Camp Road is already putting pressure on the need to provide a rainwater channel inside the kerb line. The channel would not only route water off the road proper but also serve to collect stones, "fines" and other material from being washed onto the road surface. This channel was a feature of the road design but we omitted it temporarily because towards the end of the construction process we nearly ran out of money to complete the road proper.

The SPA has the power to enforce completion of this section of channel because it formed part of the municipally approved specification and design. Our intention is to ask the affected owners to undertake independently or stump up for the particular stretch of channel along their individual frontages. We don't believe this would be onerous because where there are existing houses they would in any case have had to pay for the drive-over grids across the channel. We will be in touch with the affected owners shortly.

We appeal again to people about to begin house construction to be very insistent on their builders keeping the place tidy - emphasize that Misty Cliffs is a Conservation Area!. The responsibility also extends to all their sub-contractors. Sand dumps must be covered against rain. Sand and stone must be frequently cleared from rainwater channels. Spilt stones and brick fragments on the road surface must be continually swept off. Cement bags and packaging materials must be collected immediately and secured against wind dispersal. Workmen must be terrorized into not throwing their empty bottles, lunch wrap, cigarette boxes, etc into the bushes, nor may the bush be used as a toilet. Builders should be reminded that a permit is required before building materials may be dumped onto a municipal road or sidewalk (for permits call 710-8144, Aubrey August).

Helped by the early rains, rehabilitation of the construction camp site and elsewhere is going well. The sour figs are spreading rapidly and pelargoniums and other thingies your scribe is too ignorant to identify are popping up all over the place. Indigenous bush immediately below the long gabion wall is thriving splendidly but it will be some time before it grows high enough to noticeably screen the gabions. The ugliest section is the slope along the south end of Old Camp Road and the main activity there at present is continually uprooting of alien seedlings and weeds.

Safety
Since our previous newsletter the wooden steps at the two ends of Old Camp Road have been constructed, and also a nice boardwalk and some steps onto the beach opposite the north end of the OCR flight. The south-end steps provide the best access to the (very overgrown) walking trail up the kloof and are also intended to prevent building staff causing erosion by scrambling up the hillside when they inevitably take a short cut. (Reminder: Access to the trail, which is on private property, requires a permit obtainable from either Mickey's Mouse Trap in Scarborough or directly from the owners, the Harris's (call 082-680-6188.)

The more-important of the various road signs ordered for Old Camp Road have at last been erected which is a great relief. Without them visitors unfamiliar with the area could easily have had accidents, and the municipality could have been held liable.

Discussions are under way, and look set to eventually bear some fruit, to improve safety along the M65. Unfortunately, regulations pertaining to this class of road don't allow reduction of the speed limit, and the SPA is opposed to speed bumps which are reputed to themselves cause accidents and are also very noisy. We are hopeful of some more road paint, more signage, a pedestrian refuge for people waiting to cross the road at the wooden steps, and one or two mirrors to help owners exit from their driveways.

Crime
No significant "incidents" have been reported for several months. This is undoubtedly a credit to Scarborough Security's vigilance and promptness, and the use of radio alarms. Scarborough itself also does remarkably well with low incident rates, and we understand that most of the evil-doers concentrate their attention on Kommetjie.

Everyone's been warned to expect power outages this winter so we remind you to have your alarm back-up batteries checked. The ordinary alarm battery in good condition will keep the system functional for only a few hours, no longer, and even when power is re-connected the battery may take 24 hours to fully re-charge. It is okay to install a much bigger battery, like a car battery, which should keep a system going for up to three days, but the trickle charger in a typical alarm system will not recharge a car battery within a tolerable time-frame. Someone would have to swop over a big battery or take it away for re-charging.

Maybe "Crime" is a relevant heading to notify you that a "rave" site has been established near Redhill with the landowner's consent. We have inquired of the municipality if services at the site are sufficient to deal with large numbers of ravers, and also if the conditions of use comply with the applicable municipal regulations. Motorists should take note that in driving in the vicinity they should be particularly alert to the possibility of encountering pedestrians not in complete control of their faculties.

Internet connection
The Passensons on Erf 9 have an ADSL connection and have offered to share it with anyone interested. Call Tim P on 082-389-2020 or Jackie on 082-948-9488. The Ps spend ten or so days at Misty every month.

Disturbances
The whale season is approaching and there will doubtless be frequent visitations by helicopters whose pilots are invariably pressed by paying sightseers to descend almost to alighting on top of the whales. This is frightening for the animals, especially those with calves, and the illegal low flying, along with foolish approaches by roaring boats, is quite likely to drive away this valuable tourist attraction.

For us land-dwellers the choppers are also a considerable noise nuisance. Unfortunately, the reality is that air traffic control is extremely lax, and breach of altitude regulations is commonplace. Also, whereas at one time company-owned aircraft could be recognised by colour, this is no longer a practicable way of positively identifying offenders. However, we are not the only people to complain, and from your committee's continual talks and meetings with the chopper owners we are now optimistic that a reasonable level of self-regulation will ensue.

The same degree of responsibility cannot be expected from the operators of jet skis - devices which are not only intrusively noisy but also seem to attract the kind of drivers who may even find it amusing to frighten whales. The background is that some hot-shot surfers use jet-ski drivers to tow them through difficult surf to access the really big breaks beyond. On the face of it this is an innocent enough activity, and therefore SANParks issued a conditional exemption that a specified maximum number of jet skis could be used for this purpose in the marine protected area off Scarborough.

The tow-surfers subsequently sought the same kind of exemption to allow them to access big breaks off Misty Cliffs and Scarborough, supposedly for occasional competitions. Again, however, the reality is that Parks don't have the staff to adequately monitor and enforce adherence to the conditions. The upshot of experience plus several abrasive consultative interactions between the residents, residents' committees, SANParks, and tow-surfers has been that self-regulation of tow-surfing and even jet-skiing in general seems highly unlikely to come about.

Dosh
Subscriptions have been trickling in but the response is still painfully slow. In committee we have discussed "naming and shaming" but for the present we believe this would be counter-productive since many of the non-payers seem to be slack rather than defiant. Will those who haven't done so yet please cough up with their R300 without delay. We cannot compel this but we need it to keep stuff in your interest going; operating hand-to-mouth is unnerving.

Internet transfers are easy and convenient. Please contact Lyn Mossop for the MCVA bank account details.

Animals
We are very happy to report that the free-running dogs on the beach have been brought sufficiently under control for Black Oyster-catchers (which don't catch or eat oysters!) to have become more numerous again. There has also been an uptick in the number of otter sightings, almost certainly for the same reason.

Another happy event has been the departure of the excessively noisy golden retrievers (with their tenant owners) from Erf 56. One of the joys of Misty Cliffs had been escape from the horrible suburban barking situation - sad, bored doggies abandoned all day under the misapprehension that their persistent barking at every wafting leaf will deter felons or alert infuriated neighbours to go-see what's happening.

Although the retrievers have gone there are still a few dogs in our enclave, and we have fielded several complaints about the barking Airedales. For the moment, however, we are more concerned about the poo situation, especially as we have minimal sidewalks and so the canines understandably lay their turds all too visibly in the roadway, to the delight of itinerant flies. Folks, Misty Cliffs is a special place and we think most of you would agree that of all places it deserves the use of poop-scoops. Most of us have dealt successfully with babies nappies so it shouldn't unduly offend our sensitivities to collect our doggiedoos.

Mussel-picking
Not every mussel gatherer has the necessary permit, and this is sometimes because they don't know where to get them. Not all post offices provide permits, although they're all supposed to. However, the PO in Long Beach Mall DOES offer permits. We have heard also, but not confirmed, that the general dealer on the corner in Kommetjie carries permits. If any of you know of other reliable sources please let us know - visitors continually ask us.

Building
Owners are being co-operative with regard to building regulations and the developments on Erven 14 and 41 are progressing well.

Plans for alterations to the house on Erf 9 are at present under consideration.

The concerns about certain building work on Erf 29 and on portions of the road reserve adjacent to the property, together with associated weakening of the support structure of the newly upgraded Old Camp Road are still awaiting finalisation with the Unicity.

The Village Association together with neighbouring property owners submitted comment to the SPA with regard to the "application for conditional use" for the entertainment/pool area made by the owner and a decision is awaited.

With regard to the weakening of support of Old Camp Road the SPA has informed us that they have agreed to the owner retaining the wall subject to their specifications at his own cost. We are in contact with the SPA to ensure that work commences as soon as possible.

The SPA has informed us that a portion of the road reserve is to be leased to the owner and the existing garage is to be demolished. They have agreed to a "temporary structure" to replace the garage. Plans are awaited.

Bureaucratic stuff
There's still nothing concrete to report on the position of the deliberations about the Integrated Zoning Scheme and matters associated with it. We, together with Scarborough, are watching this as closely as it's possible to get. A body formed some time ago, the Greater Cape Town Civic Alliance (GCTCA) has similar interests and concerns but was for some time too fragmented and dispersed to be effective. However, its act is getting more together now and we are hopeful that having citizens speaking with one voice will help concentrate the minds of those officials believed to be handling the IZS and related matters.

Contact
For anything to do with or arising out of our newsletters, in the first instance contact the appropriate committee member or contact Tim Anderson.