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 Your Forum wishes you a successful and fulfilling 2011 in the service of the people of our province. We would like to fill you in on current developments and some of our plans for the year ahead.Meeting with Chief Operations Officer After numerous delays and postponements the Forum’s Management Committee will be meeting with Shoki Tshabalala, Chief Operations Officer: Social Development in the DHSD, on 20 January. The intention is to get the Agenda for Action back on track – this being the agenda that emerged from the last Gauteng Welfare Summit, but which fell off the table after the merging of the provincial Departments of Health and Social Development. While this document dates back to 2008, the issues are still very current: the urgent need for a new financing deal for NPOs, the need to complete the Gauteng Social Audit as a basis for planning and budgeting, challenges in the partnership between the Department and civil society, human resourcing issues, the ongoing problems with the monitoring and evaluation system, and so on. The Agenda for Action addresses all these matters and more, and was the product of a huge amount of work by both the NPOs and officials of the Department – we cannot afford not to proceed with it. If you have current problems in relation to subsidy payments and/or M & E procedures, you are asked please to let us have full details of these as a matter of urgency, so that we are up to date this regard when we attend the above meeting. Free State High Court case In December the Department of Social Development in the Free State presented the High Court in that province with a proposed approach to NPO financing, to comply with an order issued by the Court on 5 August 2010. The document filed by the Department consists mainly of a report drawn up by the auditing firm KPMG, which was engaged by the Department to assist them in the task of developing a financing policy which would meet the requirements of the Constitution as per the Court’s order. It was required inter alia that the Department’s legal responsibility to ensure the provision of certain services must be recognised, and that the amount of money which NPOs themselves could reasonably be expected to raise must be clarified. The Free State DSD’s response to the Court is disappointing to say the least. We will provide more details is a separate message to you, but to cut a long story short, KPMG has worked out a formula whereby the existing inadequate budget for NPO services can be shared out in a fair and logical way between all the NPOs involved. It does not address the central issue of government’s obligation to budget adequately for its social welfare obligations, including those delegated to NPOs. NAWONGO and its partners, who brought the case against the DSD to the Court last year, will be responding within the next few weeks. The NWSSDF/NACOSS Joint Strategic Committee will no doubt continue to contribute to the discussions in this regard. We will keep you informed of progress. Strengthening the Regional Forums A need has been identified for more clarity for the five Regional Forums in the province regarding their role at the local and provincial levels, and for a strengthening of communication between these levels. Our Management Committee meeting in March will include a workshop on the role and operations of Regional Forums. Each region should please ensure that its Chairperson, Vice-Chairperson, Secretary and Treasurer as well as its Manco reps and alternates attend this meeting, which will take place on Tuesday 1 March 2010. Anyone else who would like to participate will be welcome. Please reserve this date (the whole day), and also discuss within your Regional Forum any specific issues your members would like the workshop to address, and let us have them in advance for the agenda. Municipal charges Since early in the Forum’s history we have engaged in advocacy for a supportive approach to NPOs by local government. We have made the point that municipalities should not erode the funding we receive from other spheres of government and from the general public by treating us as a source of revenue. Rather there should be active support for our endeavours, which should be seen as critical to the success of municipal strategies. A Grant-in-Aid should be a positive contribution to our work, and not a reduction in rates, from which social service properties should in any case be exempt. In 2011 we plan to approach the provincial Department of Local Government and Housing to push for a shift in policy. But for this purpose we need to know what is going on in the regions. There seem to be considerable differences in the approaches taken by different municipalities in our province and we need to get the facts straight. So we ask all organisations to let us have, by 31 January 2011, the following information, along with the name and contact details of your organisation:
Your Forum has a number of events planned for the coming months, including the following:
Enquiries: Jackie Loffell, Provincial Coordinator: 082-454-0991, This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it Elsie Dlomo, Provincial Secretary: 011-334-6638, This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it Bookmark this article:          |
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