Public Services in Milnerton

Milnerton Fire Station

The Volunteer Fire Brigade

 

The need for a fire station was brought home by the outbreak of a serious fire at Ascot on 28 February 1948, which destroyed some of the stands overlooking the course. A temporary arrangement was made with the Cape Town City Council that the Salt River Fire Brigade would respond to fires at Milnerton. This arrangement lasted until 1956.

In 1956, an agreement was reached with the Goodwood Fire Brigade that, in case of need, it would serve Milnerton, and this arrangement continued for years. However, when it was discovered that the Goodwood Brigade required at least 12 minutes to get to Milnerton, complaints were rife that, in an emergency, this might prove disastrous. Hence, early in 1957, a campaign was launched for volunteers living in Milnerton to serve on a volunteer basis. However, notwithstanding the appointment of a Chief Fire Officer and of two Firemasters, the response from the public was inadequate, despite the offer of 5/- per practice turn-out and one guinea per turn-out in respect of an actual fire.

On the evening of 3 July 1957, a fire broke out at the property of R. V. Ritchie in Alamein Road. The volunteers’ response is strongly reminiscent of the Keystone Cops. “Members of the Brigade immediately started searching for the hydrant, and Mr Schumann tried to take the machine into the grounds of the property, in order to use the auxiliary hose on the machine. In doing so, the extension ladder on the machine caught the arch over the entrance gate, with the result that the mountings for the extension ladder and the hose reel were broken and bent. The top platform of the machine splintered at the one end, and one of the rear panels of the machine broke.” Despite these calamities, the Brigade was on the scene of the outbreak in less than 10 minutes.  From these events, the Town Clerk deduced that “the Volunteer Fire Brigade, established by this Council, can and does operate efficiently and can give adequate fire protection”. Additional fire hydrants, however, were essential, the nearest to the scene of the conflagration being in Pienaar Road. 1,100 feet of hose were also needed.

The Volunteer Brigade continued to lead a relatively uneventful existence, but it was declining in effectiveness and before the 1960s ended it was disbanded, its engine, very appropriately, being sent to the Veteran Car Organisation. For the time being, Milnerton depended for its fire services upon the agreement with the Goodwood Municipality for the town itself, while the newly-established industries, the Caltex Oil Refinery and the fertiliser works of Fedmis, were, until further notice, protected by Cape Town.

Not until June 1970 did Milnerton acquire its own full-time and very efficient Fire Brigade, stationed near Killarney.

Milnerton Police Station

 

In 1946, the Government bought two lots on Koeberg Road, between Dordrecht and Firgrove Roads, for the erection of a police station. I remember the charge office well, with its separate entrances for "Europeans Only" and "Non-Europeans Only". I also remember their yellow patrol vans.

 

The original police station as it is today (courtesy of Google maps)

This police station served the entire suburb, as well as Rugby and part of Brooklyn, until the 1970s, when a new, much larger police station was built on the opposite side of Koeberg Road in the area then known as Marconi Beam. In June 1992, in an attempt to contain crime in Marconi Beam, a police caravan was set up at the southern end of the settlement. It was manned on a 24-hour basis and had radio links with the main police station. The police also undertook to train 18 special force constables recruited from the community to patrol the area. These efforts were only partially successful, however, with the community lodging numerous complaints about the quality of policing and much anger about the handling of crime investigations within the camp. At one stage, this anger resulted in members of the community destroying the police satellite station.

In 1996, a representative of the Stable Workers Union told the Milnerton Community Policing Forum (CPF) that: “Every week there are incidents of stabbing, rape and child abuse. We only see the police once a month and there are no regular patrols, neither during the day nor at night.”

Construction work on a new multi-faceted Milnerton police station began round about 2007. The project entailed the completion of a triple-storey office block, community service centre and a new cell block. External works included new paving, palisade and wire mesh fencing and gates, as well as the upgrade of the existing site services. Unfortunately, there was a problem with the original building contractor, resulting in the police station standing empty and half-built for at least two years. Work was resumed only in 2010. In the meanwhile, the Milnerton police operated out of four houses in Montague Gardens. The new police station was officially opened in October 2011.

On 22 May 2008, xenophobic attacks in the Du Noon informal settlement resulted in more than 500 “foreigners” mostly Zimbabweans, taking temporary refuge at the Milnerton police station. There was widespread criticism of the Milnerton police for not having done enough to prevent these attacks, when they should have foreseen the likelihood of xenophobic violence breaking out in the settlement, as had already happened elsewhere in the country.

Residents and neighbourhood watches have highlighted the station’s lack of resources as a major obstacle in the fight against crime. During a public meeting in November 2015, station commander Brigadier Marius Stander admitted that he had received numerous complaints about “substandard service” from the police. He explained that SAPS does not have enough resources to police the whole of Milnerton and its neighbouring suburbs, and therefore needs to focus on high crime areas. Sadly, this has led to widespread perceptions of police indifference to community concerns, and even of corruption. The arrest of a Milnerton-based detective on charges of corruption in August 2016 seemed to confirm these perceptions.

In December 2016, officers at the various police stations in the Milnerton cluster arrested a total of 717 people during anti-crime operations. This restored a modicum of community confidence in the local police, but it did not last long.

In April 2017, Brigadier Stander told the Milnerton Community Policing Forum that it would no longer be allowed to attend the Milnerton Integrated Security Forum. They were told that only PSIRA-registered security companies would be allowed to attend, as SAPS has a regulatory mandate over these companies. Captain FC Van Wyk from SAPS Western Cape confirmed this. He said that the meetings were of an operational nature and that it was decided to limit participation. Milnerton residents expressed anger and concern over the change, questioning why CPFs in other areas were allowed to attend their security forums.

On 24 June 2017, SAPS Milnerton Cluster organised a Youth Month programme at the Multi-Purpose Sports Field in Atlantis to reach out to the community there. About 800 children took part in many fun activities, including painting of banners, face painting, entertainment by youth groups, making noise against crime and visiting static exhibitions. Such initiatives, while “winning hearts and minds” and keeping children off the streets during the school holidays, will not improve the police force’s reputation in communities which are still beset by crime.

In June 2017, residents in Phoenix claimed that they were facing serious policing issues. They attested that there was drug dealing and criminal activity happening on their doorsteps, but when the police were notified, they asked residents to provide proof. During the previous sub-council meeting in May, a representative from Phoenix Neighbourhood Watch listed a number of crime prevention measures that had been requested for Ward 4, but which had not yet been implemented. These included CCTV cameras on Freedom Way and additional law enforcement officers in Ward 4 “as [the police] have insufficient resources”.

On 26 June 2017, during a violent protest about evictions, residents of Joe Slovo Park torched their Community Centre and stoned police who tried to restore order. Milnerton SAPS were ordered to withdraw from the area and wait for the Public Order Police to arrive. Some Joe Slovo residents were critical of the Milnerton police for their perceived inaction.

On 25 July 2017, hundreds of women from Du Noon, many carrying young children, marched to the Milnerton Police station to protest about lawlessness in their township. There were no men in attendance. The protest was sparked by the most recent rape and murder of a 34-year-old woman on 30 May. At the police station, the women handed over a memorandum of grievances to the station commander. Among other things, the memorandum demanded that more police officers be deployed to patrol Du Noon and that a police station be set up in the township.

Women demand a police station in Du Noon

On the same day, a 17-year-old boy was stabbed and robbed of his cellphone on his way to the De Grendel Special Needs School in Milnerton. Earlier that morning, two other learners had also been robbed. The school is a short distance from the police station. Understandably, the community regards such attacks in broad daylight as a symptom of the breakdown of law and order in the area. According to Crime Stats SA, there were 40 murders in the Milnerton precinct in 2016 and 813 recorded drug-related crimes.

In their defence, Milnerton SAPS do respond to many complaints. In October 2015, Brigadier Stander informed a public meeting that Milnerton SAPS had responded to 15,668 complaints, with an average response time of 16 minutes, in the previous calendar year. This is an average of 43 complaints per day.

Milnerton Library

On 29 September 1965, the Milnerton Town Council held a meeting to consider library facilities. As early as 28 August 1957, a letter had arrived from the Regional Librarian of the Cape Provincial Administration’s Library Service, asking when the Council proposed to set up a branch of its own. He was informed that, for lack of finance and of suitable buildings, nothing could be done, but that it was hoped when, some time, a Civic Centre was established, suitable provision would be made. Now, eight years later, offers had once more been received from the Director of Provincial Library Services, to include the Municipality within the scope of its operations. This time there was no hesitation, and support was given by individuals such as Mr Theo Marais, willing on their own account to contribute books. At a meeting, also attended by an architect and by representatives of the Ratepayers’ Association, lengthy discussion ensued as to the scale of the proposed building, some conservative Councillors even recommending the continuance of the existing system of relying for facilities on Cape Town itself. 

Endless delays occurred and a variety of sites became subjects for argument. The increased vigour of the Council overcame the various obstructions by allocating to this purpose portion of the new Municipal Offices then under construction, though it was limited to 800 square feet on the ground floor and 1,000 square feet on the first floor. The latter was taken over by the newly-established Town Engineer’s Department, but on 1 July 1968, the Milnerton Public Library opened its doors to the public. Staffed by Municipal employees, it was at the outset restricted to the area immediately behind the Reception Desk. Yet books stocked amounted to 8,500 and the response, with 2,000 registered borrowers at the start, was so encouraging that the need was acknowledged for something more adequate as soon as possible. Not until 17 June 1970 was finality reached on the layout, and the big day came on 9 July 1972, when His Honour the Administrator of the Cape, Mr AM Vosloo, formally inaugurated the new Milnerton Library in the extended block, amid the enthusiasm of a substantial crowd. Both staff and book stocks have since reached more impressive dimensions.

One of the major shortcomings of the library, however, is its lack of inclusivity. During the political transition, there were no residents of nearby Marconi Beam among the 29,000 members of the library. The low level of literacy in Marconi Beam and the fact that the library had few books in isiXhosa may have contributed to this situation, but until the library staff are proactive in procuring books written in isiXhosa and launch membership drives in the schools and community centres of the black residents, the situation is unlikely to improve.

Milnerton Mediclinic and Netcare Blaauwberg

Milnerton Mediclinic

There are no state hospitals in the greater Milnerton area, besides the Brooklyn Chest Hospital. Even the clinic that used to operate from the Martin Adams Hall in Brooklyn has ceased to operate. The only fully-fledged hospitals are both privately owned, They are the Milnerton Mediclinic in Racecourse Road and Netcare Blaauwberg.