Discussion about the how to solve the water shortage

Today this e-mail was sent to all house owners

Dear house owners of Mararo court

The interim committee has met on the 9^th of July to discuss the water issues, and I would like to share with you the discussion and decision we had. I would like to apologies for the delay, as you all know the interim committee are volunteers, and I had to put my professional obligation first.

Present where Florence Isahio, Patrick Kanyingi and myself.

We discussed the urgency of the water shortage and discussed the following options :

1. Increasing the water storage capacity on the roof. We contacted the developer who says that our physical structure does not allow to increase the weight on the roof. Therefore this option will not be further followed.
2. Rehabilitating the current borehole. As you know, the current problem is a lack of water in the acquifer, i.e. we need to dig into a deeper acquirer. We did this last year. But the problem is with digging further, that the wall of the channel cannot be made concrete. As a result with a drought, the extension collapsed. This could be rehabilitated by the risk of collapsing again is very high and there is no guarantee that there is water. The committee has decided that this is not a sustainable solution.
3. We dig a new borehole, we have an offer that turns around 2.2 million for Mararo court that reaches a deeper aquifer. Given climate change, the emerging estates in the surroundings with borehole, it is unclear for how long there will be water in a lower aquifer, i.e. for how long this option is sustainable
4. We get an underground storage to store more water. When city water comes, we actually have all our reservoirs full before the water stops. In principle, we could store more. But the water recently came only every second week. This option implies that we will still need to buy water from a truck. We have an offer for this which is about 0.5 mio.

So as we see it now, houseowner need to make a decision about 3 options

1. Keep the status co and buy water with truck (we have just changed provider and the unit price will now be around 450 kes and not 500 kes as until now)
2. Sink a new borehole with a cost of about 2.2 mio.
3. Get an underground storage for the cost of 0.5 mio

Houseowner will be invited to discuss this and get offers for option 2 or 3 to compare with the offers that the interm committee has.

Once we have all option set out we will offer house owners to vote about their favourite option (probably through online votes). For option for the borehole or the underground tank, we will need to raise capital. We propose that we implement the options that got at least 50 units willing to pay.

Therefore, we propose the following financing structure :

1. Once a given option is chosen, houseowners will be asked to pay to pay a share that will be computed as total cost of the option / 48 (we are 96 units, so if everybody pays we have more money than needed, see point 4 of this list)
2. As soon as at least 48 units have paid their share to the bank account the project will be implemented.
3. Those units who have paid will be charged the new water lower water price at real cost. Those units who have not paid their share will be charge 500 kes per unit or the price of water from the truck (whatever is more expensive). The higher price will be charged for two years or until cost are recovered from those units who did not pay (whatever has a longer duration)
4. Any “benefit” we make from this scheme will be kept for capital investment on our property (for example buying a new generator or any other major capital investment that is needed in the up-coming years) Houseowners will have a say on how this money will be spent

Why do we propose this scheme? We do not want to allow for free riding of houseowners on the back of the others. Those who put it new capital should also be benefit but not the others.  

Next to the water issue, the committee also discussed audits of the account. All attempts we did to do this have failed until now. We are discussing new options to get this done. We also discussed more general issues related to the management of the compound about which we will come back to you in due time.

As far as I have understood, the meeting with houseowners that was decided in the committee is today, with the objective to discuss the water issue as well as the audit.

I am unfortunately on duty travel abroad and therefore will not be able to join, I wish you a successful meeting. I am looking forward to hear your opinions.

Kind regards,

Catherine