We are Planning Ahead
It’s budget time at Drakenstein Municipality – time to sharpen our pencils, do projections, finalise the figures, and plan ahead.
This past month, our residents and businesses have had the opportunity to give their input into the Municipality’s Draft Budget for the new financial year, which starts on 1 July 2023, as well as our Draft Integrated Development Plan (IDP), which is the Municipality’s business plan. One amazing tool that the Municipality uses every day to analyse, forecast, plan, visualise, and manage services is our cool Geographic Information System (GIS) . Vars had coffee with Naajidah Lagardien-Du Plessis, GIS Engineering Technician, and her team to show us how this fascinating system works. With all of Drakenstein’s geographic and spatial information in a single basket (no less than 280 layers of data and 70 web applications!), it not only helps the Municipality to draw the roadmap for Drakenstein but also gives investors an in-depth look into our business or investment environment. As we’re planning how to grow our city of excellence further in the new financial year, Drakenstein also reflects on our two-year Fair Trade City journey . On 30 April 2021, we became the first Fair Trade City in South Africa, and the fourth in Africa. “We’re proud to be part of a global community that supports trade that is not only good for the environment but also underwrites decent working conditions and a fair income for our farmers and workers,” explains Alderman Conrad Poole, our Executive Mayor. Planning ahead is equally important for our entrepreneurs. Vars collected some pearls of wisdom for them from Labit, an empowering business incubator based in Drakenstein, that believes in making it possible for entrepreneurs to have an economic and social impact on local communities. Essentially, they follow a three- step approach to business incubation: deconstruct, rethink, and reconstruct. In this month’s Vars , we look at why it is so important to crack down on the owners of dilapidated or problem buildings in Drakenstein, and how our new Municipal Court has been helping us to do just that. Not only are these buildings an eyesore and hamper potential investment, development, and tourism to Drakenstein, but they are also unsafe and demoralising for our local communities and businesses.
4
VARS | May
Made with FlippingBook Digital Proposal Creator