Winter residents meeting 2024

Summary

Winter residents meeting
Monday 9th December 2024

Attended by:

Residents
Yves, Monica, Nat, Ian, Debbie, Brian, Miro, Keisha, Nell, Rich.

From Southern Housing
Billy Blankson, estate manager
Norma, our caretaker

Local councillor
Patrick Pinkerton

We have had less meetings this year with energy shifting to the walkabouts. The walkabouts seem to have been relatively effective in being able to directly raise specific issues, although hampered by increasing lack of Southern housing presence.

Recurring themes were present at the meeting as always, updates were shared and ideas raised and discussed.

Updates

We were joined by Billy Blankson, who is about to leave us as estate manager to return to the West London area to continue managing an estate there, as is leaseholder manager Elsa Caldeira who is leaving Southern Housing permanently. Southern housing will be restructuring and moving estate management to a team who will cover Hackney estates. This is a result of the merger with Optivo and reflects the structure they have been using. Residents present at the meeting raised concerns over this possibly worsening the ongoing problem of jobs not being followed through and information being constantly lost. There were also concerns about further weakening knowledge around estate issues. It was discussed that organising an initial meeting with the new team would be beneficial in terms of the transition and going forward.

Group chair, Rich Holman fed back on his recent meeting with residents from Stamford estate, also managed by Southern Housing. The aim of the meeting was to discuss common issues and for Rich to advise and share experience of our estates residents association.

We were also joined by our new local councillor for Cazenove, Patrick Pinkerton. He emphasised his availability for assisting with estate issues and is taking a particular interest in fly tipping and antisocial behaviour. You can find his details along with others on the contacts page.

We heard from a resident who recently experienced a worrying incident on the estate at 7am while it was still dark and the estate lighting had not yet come on. She was followed by a man who approached and held her by the arms until she shouted and he ran away. We also heard from one of our older residents, who recently found that somebody had forcibly attempted to enter his flat. Questions around local policing were raised and it was pointed out that the local Cazenove ward panel, with council and police representatives is held periodically in The Boiler House, and is run by a resident on the estate.

In CCTV news we learned that the estate parking management company might be in a position to install ANPR cameras which would be positioned in a spot that could also pick up numberplates of vehicles engaging in fly tipping. There would be no cost for residents as ticketing would cover the cost.

Recurring themes

The same main issues came up, in particular complaints about maintenance jobs being left without action, even with multiple residents actively reporting, recording and managing the issues and raising formal complaints. This is obviously completely unacceptable.

Some improvement has been reported with service centre communications since Southern Housing brought the reporting system in house, and the addition of case numbers has proved helpful in connecting information.

Many residents have been finding they are unable reach South Housing outside of office hours, meaning there is no emergency response in place for residents. This has been highlighted as a serious and important point for improvement. Instances of residents being stuck in their own homes, unable to leave when lifts have been out for days at a time have become alarmingly common.

It was discussed that Southern Housing seem to be more effectual in executing large contract works but far less so with individual pieces of day-to-day maintenance, leading to a multitude of unnecessarily worsening problems that then need to be repaired or replaced at a higher costs to residents.

There seems to have been some improvement in quality and quantity of work undertaken since the maintenance contract system has changed. AXIS have replaced United Living as the main contractors and Southern Housing are also now able to directly put specific jobs to tender to outside contractors rather than this having to go through United Living.

One resident raised frustration in trying to get Southern Housing to take action around damp and mould in their home. Another resident suggested contacting the damp and mould team directly and shared the contact details https://www.southernhousing.org.uk/managing-your-home/damp-and-mould stating she had found it best to directly contact the team.

Ideas

We made a plan to propose Southern housing commits to a series of theme specific walkabouts - maybe four over the course of the next year on the subjects of safety, maintenance, costs and cleaning and push for associated representatives from Southern housing to take a strong role in this.

The idea of connecting to other Southern Housing estates in Hackney is in progress with links so far to Stamford Hill estate, Lewis Gardens and Amhurst Park. If residents know people in other Southern housing estates in Hackney it would be helpful to start conversations with them about connecting.

Our councillor Patrick Pinkerton added some knowledge about resident group structures within happening councils own housing, which includes having block representatives, and a structure of resident group representatives from different states meeting to combine forces to make positive impact on our issues.

Next steps

• Begin engagement with the new management team

• Start to plan themed walkabouts and contact theme specific Southern Housing representatives

• Continue to connect with other Southern Housing Estates in Hackney