News / Local
Bulawayo residents to be charged per toilet, bins
08 Apr 2014 at 09:38hrs | Views
Bulawayo residents will soon receive their sewage and solid waste management bills charged according to the number of bins and toilets they have as the local authority embarks on door-to-door visits collecting data.
The development will see people who have more than one toilet or bin forking out more for the services that the Bulawayo City Council (BCC) provides the sewer reticulation and solid waste management.
According to the council's official Facebook page, residents have been told to be on the lookout and receive BCC employees who will be moving door to door collecting data.
"Bulawayo City Council will be undertaking an exercise to update information about properties in its data base from April 1 2014 onwards. Residents are advised that they will be visited by Council officials collecting data about your property," reads the post.
Currently, high density suburbs are paying about $7 towards sewer services, with $1,50 going towards sewerage and the remainder being for solid waste collection. The charges have not been co-opting the number of toilets.
"The exercise requires that we do a physical check for example of the number of toilets that you have on your property. In some cases a household may be billed for two toilets when it actually has four, you may be billed for three bins when you have two, and that requires a physical check," reads some of the responses to questions asked by residents on the page.
In the process of obtaining door-to-door data, the city council workers would be entering each room to check if there are en-suite toilets, a move that is likely to infringe on residents' privacy.
"When we are checking inside your house, we would request to be accompanied to each room. If the owner of the house is not there we leave our contact details and request that you set an appointment that would be most convenient for you."
Bulawayo Mayor Martin Moyo said residents had been illegally constructing their structures without following proper council proceedures.
"Residents have not been following council procedures of obtaining a certificate of occupation before they can live in a house that has been constructed and as a result we have not obtained database about their toilet seats so as to bill them accordingly." he said.
The development will see people who have more than one toilet or bin forking out more for the services that the Bulawayo City Council (BCC) provides the sewer reticulation and solid waste management.
According to the council's official Facebook page, residents have been told to be on the lookout and receive BCC employees who will be moving door to door collecting data.
"Bulawayo City Council will be undertaking an exercise to update information about properties in its data base from April 1 2014 onwards. Residents are advised that they will be visited by Council officials collecting data about your property," reads the post.
Currently, high density suburbs are paying about $7 towards sewer services, with $1,50 going towards sewerage and the remainder being for solid waste collection. The charges have not been co-opting the number of toilets.
"The exercise requires that we do a physical check for example of the number of toilets that you have on your property. In some cases a household may be billed for two toilets when it actually has four, you may be billed for three bins when you have two, and that requires a physical check," reads some of the responses to questions asked by residents on the page.
In the process of obtaining door-to-door data, the city council workers would be entering each room to check if there are en-suite toilets, a move that is likely to infringe on residents' privacy.
"When we are checking inside your house, we would request to be accompanied to each room. If the owner of the house is not there we leave our contact details and request that you set an appointment that would be most convenient for you."
Bulawayo Mayor Martin Moyo said residents had been illegally constructing their structures without following proper council proceedures.
"Residents have not been following council procedures of obtaining a certificate of occupation before they can live in a house that has been constructed and as a result we have not obtained database about their toilet seats so as to bill them accordingly." he said.
Source - Zim Mail
