STATEMENT BY THE CITY’S EXECUTIVE MAYOR, PATRICIA DE LILLE
Good evening, Good evening, Molweni, Goeie Naand, Salaamu-Alaikum, Shalom, Namaste.
It is my great honour to be with all of you tonight, the nominees and star performers for the 2018 Mayoral Awards.
Let me start by thanking you all for your commitment, hard work and the many hours you give to deliver your best to the people of Cape Town. Without you, Cape Town will not be a well-run city.
My job sometimes involves getting up on stages to share how well Cape Town performs and to talk about the many accolades we have won. But those accolades are because of all of you and the dedication you have to your work. So my sincere gratitude goes to each person here tonight.
There are of course many of our other colleagues who are not here tonight as we only brought the shortlisted candidates together. But every one of the 26 000 staff members in the City of Cape Town must be thanked for what they do to serve the residents of our city each day.
Our jobs are not easy, we sacrifice a lot, work many long hours including over weekends and we miss out on a lot with family and friends. Sometimes our jobs are thankless but I want you all to know that the City leadership values all of you and the work you do.
We know from the Siyamamela survey we did more than five years ago and the City Pulse survey this year that many staff members want to be recognised for the work they do. I know the value of a thank you and what it does to people’s morale and the overall workplace culture. That is why I initiated the Mayoral Awards in 2015 to honour staff members who excel in their work.
For the 2015 Mayoral Awards, we received a total of 52 nominations with 174 employees nominated in 5 categories. This year saw these numbers increase to 188 nominations with 883 employees being nominated in 6 categories. The significant increase in the amount of nominations shows the great progress of our people in recognising each other and to grow a culture of recognition and reward.
The nominations are made in six categories with each linked to one of the City Values including: integrity, service excellence, accountability, accessibility and trust. These are the values of our Organisational Development and Transformation Plan (ODTP).
All employees and teams nominated in the 6 categories demonstrated exceptional contributions to the City’s values and showed behavior that consistently demonstrated service excellence to customers.
For example, employees and teams nominated in the category ‘Outstanding Service to the Community’ performed their job with integrity while providing outstanding service to the community. The staff members in this category conduct themselves in a manner which consistently and publicly supports the City’s vision and mission while always doing the right thing, going the extra mile for the community, being honest and treating everyone with fairness and respect.
Employees and teams nominated in the category of the ‘Customer Care Award’ demonstrated a caring attitude towards customers and/or fellow employees. In doing so, they showed service excellence by enhancing the standards for response times for service delivery outages.
In closing, in anything like this, there can only be one winner but I mean it when I say that all of you here tonight personify excellence in service delivery. Once again, my heartfelt thanks goes to each person for everything you put into your job. We work in very tough circumstances but keep giving your best because that is what the people of Cape Town deserve. You are the ambassadors of a well-run, opportunity, caring, safe and inclusive city. Let us make sure we internalise those goals every day so that we keep enhancing excellence in service delivery. Let us stay committed to making progress possible together.
Let us together build a city we can proudly hand over to our children. Thank you, baie dankie, enkosi, shukran and God Bless you all.
The nominees and winners per category were:
Award: Outstanding Service to the Community:
Nominees:
1. A Safety and Security staff member who brought the Smash and Grab syndicate to book.
2. Teams from Informal Settlements and an Anti-Land Invasion team that issued 70% more flood kits than in 2017 and removed 700% more illegal structures than in previous years.
3. A Transport and Urban Development staff member who tirelessly sought solutions for communities in the complex stakeholder engagement landscape.
Winner: Sergeant Sandile Sololo from Metro Police:
Sergeant Sololo continues to go beyond the call of duty to bring the Smash and Grab syndicate that has been tormenting our motorists to book. He was instrumental in numerous Smash and Grab arrests in and around the Langa area. Sergeant Sololo commanded successful operations with Langa SAPS in June 2017 to find and arrest the suspect who attacked and shot his colleague Constable Mini. On September 10, 2017 Sergeant Sololo followed up on information received involving Smash and Grab suspects. Upon taking action, a shootout ensued in which two suspects were fatally wounded. Five suspects were arrested and the firearm taken from Constable Mini during his attack was recovered.
Award: Customer Care Award
Nominees:
1. An investigating officer in the Ombusdman’s Office who proactively mitigates risks, resolved the most cases in the 17/18 financial year and ensures quick responses to complaints.
2. A staff member from Supply Chain Management who assisted up to 20 000 customers to register on the Supplier Database.
3. A First Line Response Team in Distribution Area South (Energy) who, with accurate measurement and the institution of corrective action for deviations, significantly improved the response time and enhanced the customers’ experience over the past financial year.
Winner: Yulanda Bennett from Supply Chain Management:
Yulanda works in the central Supplier Database Walk-in Centre. It is the only Walk-in Centre other than National Treasury. On a daily basis she has to assist suppliers to register on the Central Supplier Database (CSD). This is very challenging as suppliers are not all tech savvy. Thanks to Yulanda’s efforts, the number of registrations have increased, giving more suppliers an opportunity to do business with the City and other State departments. The CSD registrations currently stand at 25 588 which is approximately 20 000 more than any other municipality in the Western Cape.
Award: Customer Innovation (Internal and external)
Nominees in this category developed and implemented innovative systems to improve service delivery such as appointment systems for our City Health Clinics, systems that monitor quality and delays in electricity generation and distribution, processes that allow for more efficient construction approvals, a model for accelerated water pressure management to respond to a day zero water crisis, and a green dot water map on the City’s website to raise greater awareness for water savings during the water crisis.
Winners of the customer innovation (internal) award: Cheryl Walters, Jaco Van der Westhuizen, Pieter Terblanche and Emil Schnackenberg from Transport and Urban Development:
Through continued reforms and streamlining of processes within the Development Management Department, Cape Town is recognized as the country leader in construction permitting. According to a recent World Bank study, due to its efficient procedures, Cape Town is able to process construction approvals typically within 88 days – faster than any other South African metro, and much faster than most high-income economies.
Winner of the customer innovation (external) award: Ken Sinclair Smith from Water and Sanitation:
Ken Sinclar Smith innovatively combined the power of social media, social psychological research and technology to create a world-first: The City of Cape Town Green Dot Meter Map (since January 2018). Not only did this application encourage water savings of between of 20 to 75%, it created widely-published interest across various media platforms and research articles. It resulted in some of the highest Internet traffic ever by a City webpage � if not the highest. This was an innovative way of addressing water savings and prompted excellent community feedback and even received a citation by the American Water Works Association.
Best Facility award:
Nominees:
1. The Vulnerable Groups and Communities Unit from the Social Development and Early Childhood Development Department were instrumental in the establishment of the Culemborg Safe Space for street people in June 2018. It is a transitional facility for up to 230 street people where they can spend the night safely off the streets. To date 180 street people have been rehabilitated.
2. The Wesfleur Waste Water Treatment Facility staff are passionate about exceeding the highest standards in water quality as required from the National Department of Water Services and adopt a ‘can do’ attitude in executing their functions.
3. The Ottery Library operates in an area where their personal safety can be at risk, but took their services to the communities in retrieving outstanding books and, at the same time, promote National Book Week in these areas, thus taking libraries to their customers.
Winners: Ottery East Library Facility: Tracey Muir-Rix, Karen Van der Heyden, Jeremiah Julius and Sharon Roman
During National Book Week, the team made a list of all the overdue books and decided that they would go door-to-door throughout the area including gang-ridden parts of the community. The team went to knock on doors letting residents know that it was ‘Fine-free week’ and that their fines would be removed if they returned their books within that week. Staff worked together and were committed to retrieve long overdue stock in an attempt to reduce costs to the City. Despite safety issues, staff used this as an opportunity to market National Book Week. Team Ottery worked together to retrieve City books and offered outstanding accessible customer service by taking the library service to the community.
Best Team Award:
Nominees:
1. Nominees in this category included the Events Department who work tirelessly and long hours to plan, host and administer the City’s numerous iconic events.
2. The City strives to contribute towards job creation and the Environmental Management Department increased its target for creating more Extended Public Works Programme (EPWP) jobs.
3. The City’s Urban Catalytic Investment Branch’s contribution towards aligning and confirming the Council’s, citizens and business vision for future spatial patterns in the City was realized through the Municipal Spatial Development Framework.
4. Colleagues from the Human Settlements Implementation Unit who exceeded the annual housing delivery target by 62%.
Winners of the Best Team Award: The Human Settlement Implementation unit.
By 30 June 2018 the TDA had delivered a total of 8 061 housing opportunities as opposed to the initial 4 961 target set for the year. The team exceeded its annual housing delivery target by 62%. This is the first time ever in the 18-year history of the City of Cape Town metro government that the delivery target has ever been exceeded. Much of this achievement is due to the exceptionally hardworking and dedicated team of project managers and the long hours they put in during the day and as part of evening community engagements to ensure that the projects run smoothly and, as far as possible, without delay.
Source: City of Cape Town