Anonymous_X: Government to Assess Town Councils (but it's not about ranking?!) | The falling accident of Siti Nur Aini Mohamed revisited

Senior Minister of State for National Development Grace Fu has clarified (or was it a reassurance to town councils?) that the initiative to assess them should not be seen as a ranking exercise.

I strongly disagree.

It MUST BE treated as a ranking exercise. We are living in a society where (sadly) ranking is everything. And whether it is right or not, a ranking system is helpful to help the person or the organization ranked low to put more effort to improve and to gain a better ranking.

Remember the quite recent accident (8 March 2009) about an eight-year-old girl, Siti Nur Aini Mohamed who fell through a gap in a metal railing at the lift landing outside her fourth-floor Telok Blangah flat? Tanjong Pagar Town Council chairman Koo Tsai Kee formed an independent inquiry committee on March 18 to find out the cause of the incident. The finding? Human error is--as often--the cause.

But what interests me is about the so-called unproven claim that Siti's grandfather & uncle had reported to the town council about the corroded railing prior to her fall.

Also couldn't be found was conclusive evidence in the voice and phone logs from the town council feedback system that proved that residents had reported the damaged railing to the authorities prior to Siti's fall.

Before I digress too far, so how the above incident is related to the ranking exercise?

The assessment should reveal that this particular Tanjong Pagar town council feedback system ought to be reviewed for its effectiveness. (That is not to say that the current system is ineffective per se, but the unproven claim had suggested that there is something amiss. That there should be an alternative or additional feedback platform where residents can report to if their earlier reports are allegedly not taken seriously.)

In short, town councils ought to be ranked--and the ranking exercise should be taken positively because it will improve the quality of service town councils provide.

The Government's impending move to assess town councils should not be seen as a ranking exercise, says Senior Minister of State for National Development Grace Fu.

It should instead be viewed as a way to give HDB residents the facts that will help them engage better with their town councils on estate management issues, Ms Fu said yesterday after a Housing Board event.

For this reason, punishing town councils that perform badly in the assessment, like reducing government grants, is 'not envisaged at the moment', she added.

She stressed that 'the whole purpose of (the report) is to allow residents and town councils to have an objective set of numbers to talk about'.

It is why the Government is asking experts such as property consultants and academics for their input on the list of criteria for assessing the councils.

The Ministry of National Development, which oversees public housing, will roll out several consultation exercises in the next few months to ask people how they want town councils to be assessed.

The Government is suggesting three main areas: cleanliness of the estate, maintenance of facilities and financial management.

The final checklist, after taking into account public feedback, is to be ready by end-September and used to evaluate the performance of the councils.

The results will be released next year in the Town Council Management Report.

Ms Fu stressed that the proposed three areas of assessment are not cast in stone and that the Government is keen to hear from both town councils and residents.

From Straits Times, "It's not about ranking".

Inadequate checks led to an eight-year-old girl's fall through a gap in a metal railing at the lift landing outside her fourth-floor Telok Blangah flat, the committee that investigated the mishap concluded.

The error stemmed from failure to detect the corroded railing, which had a towel draped over it.

Siti Nur Aini Mohamed was playing at the lift landing on March 8 this year, when she plunged four storeys.

The girl sustained multiple fractures and was warded in the intensive care unit at National University Hospital for two weeks after developing a blood clot in her brain.

Tanjong Pagar Town Council chairman Koo Tsai Kee formed an independent inquiry committee on March 18 to find out the cause of the incident.

The committee comprised architect Johnny Tan Cheng Hye as chairman of the group, as well as lawyer K. Anparasan and engineer Teh Hee Seang.

'We are of the view that the unfortunate incident is a one-off,' said Mr Tan at a press conference on Wednesday. 'The problem occurred due to human error.'

The 60-day inquiry found that while the Tanjong Pagar Town Council's Residents Feedback System was 'fairly comprehensive', the telephone operators were not trained to deal with complaints about building defects.

The committee was also unable to find conclusive evidence in the voice and phone logs from the town council feedback system that proved that residents had reported the damaged railing to the authorities prior to Siti's fall.

Earlier media reports quoted two residents, besides the girl's grandfather and uncle, saying they had made reports to the town council about the corroded railing, but they were not checked out.

From Straits Times, "Girl's fall due to human error".

Little Siti Nur Aini Mohamed is now all smiles, and is jumping and running around in her home - two months after falling through a gap in the railings outside her Telok Blangah Crescent flat.

The Blangah Rise Primary 2 pupil, eight, suffered multiple fractures and went through no fewer than three operations as a result of the fall.

She was playing hide-and-seek with her uncle, national serviceman Muhammad Syukur Johari, 21, when she fell on March 8.

Yesterday, an independent inquiry chaired by architect Johnny Tan absolved the Tanjong Pagar Town Council of any blame and found that there was nothing wrong with its maintenance programme and telephone feedback system.

It was "human oversight" which was to blame, said Mr Tan.

The officer who last checked the railings in February failed to spot the severe corrosion and missing railings at the fourth-storey lift landing. He has since been deployed to a new job.

Tanjong Pagar Town Council general manager Simon Koh, 48, told my paper that the replacement is a polytechnic graduate with at least 10 years of town-council work experience.

The inquiry committee also recommended that property officers who inspect the estate also check the condition of railings.

This can be done by removing old layers of paint during maintenance.

Typically, an officer looks after 15 to 20 blocks of Housing Board flats.

In addition to ongoing monthly inspections, Mr Koh added that the town council will be implementing an extra layer of checks.

Two property officers will be tasked specifically to check the condition of railings every six months.

Following Siti's fall, Radin Mas Citizens' Consultative Committee set up a $10,000 trust fund for her education. It will be administered by her school.

Her family is also receiving $800 of NTUC FairPrice vouchers,from March to August this year.

The girl's grandfather, Mr Johari Muhammad Siamu, 69, said the help they received went "beyond (his) expectations".

The pensioner added: "I'm worried about Siti but, now, her medication and education have been taken care of. It's time to look forward, for the sake of her future."

From Asiaone, "Girl's fall due to human oversight, says inquiry".

Update on 14/06: Mr. Mah Bow Tan has emphasized that the report on town councils is not meant to be ranking exercise at all. Pity.

National Development Minister Mah Bow Tan has said his ministry's report on town councils is not meant to be a ranking exercise.

The report, due next year, will look at how a town fares in areas such as cleanliness.

Mr Mah said towns have different characteristics, so comparisons, while inevitable, are not appropriate.

He said: "Some towns are older, some younger, some towns are more spread out, (while) some are more compact. So these towns have their own special characteristics, (and) it's not quite appropriate to take one set of numbers and compare them."

Instead, Mr Mah said the aim of the report is to let residents know more about their estates. And should a town fare badly, he said residents should make their views known to their local council.

The evaluation exercise covering all 16 towns here included the two in opposition wards, raising questions on whether they will be at a disadvantage as they have fewer resources.

Mr Mah said: "All town councils will have to look at all the resources available to them. For example, the S&C (service and conservancy) grants that they get, the government grants we give to all town councils.

"Look at all these resources and see how best they can make use of (them). And this is the challenge for all town councils, PAP and opposition."

Mr Mah was speaking at the launch of a community initiative in Tampines.

With the current economic downturn, many neighbourhood shops have experienced a drop in their business as consumers watch their spending.

Thus, the Tampines Grassroots Organisations and Tampines Street 11 Hawkers' and Merchants' Association are launching a new initiative to bring in foreign tourists to the Tampines neighbourhood centre. They will be organising shopping trips for foreign tourists.

The initiative is part of a wider Tampines Together programme launched in May. The programme was put together by Members of Parliament (MPs) and grassroots leaders in Tampines GRC to help residents ride through the economic downturn.

As part of this programme, the Tampines Changkat Sunday Market at Tampines Round Market has been expanded to operate on Saturdays as well. The scheme aims to help unemployed residents earn some money to tide them over difficult times and to become more self-reliant.

From Sunday till Friday, 250 needy elderly residents in Tampines will be getting free dental checks and treatment as part of the Tampines Together programme.

From Channel NewsAsia, "Town council report not meant to be ranking exercise".

Update on 21/08: the latest news has the assessment to be carried out from October this year. Three indicators would be crucial: cleanliness, estate maintenance and financial management. I'd love to see & compare how the estates shall fare.

From October this year, town councils will be assessed on their performance under a proposed report card.

They will have about six months to familiarise themselves with the new benchmarks before the first Town Council Management Report is produced by mid-next year.

The initiative to assess town councils was started about two months back. The aim is to give residents the right information so they can better engage those managing their estates and living environments.

After two months of public consultation, it came down to an expert panel. Made up of government officials, realtors and academics, the panel will recommend what will make up the assessment report card.

But before that, they visited the Bishan-Toa Payoh estate to get a better sense of a town council's daily operations.

The estate was chosen because it presents a good example of old and new Singapore. It is a dense town with some 50,000 dwelling units and old flats dating back to the 1960s, as well as new ones still being built.

So far, three broad areas - cleanliness, estate maintenance and financial management - have been identified as assessment indicators.

The way town councils invested their funds came under the spotlight when it was revealed in parliament last year that several People's Action Party (PAP) town councils had invested a total of S$16 million in toxic financial products linked to Lehman Brothers.

The work now is how to break down the indicators so that the assessment is fair to town councils, and the results meaningful to residents.

Senior Minister of State for National Development, Grace Fu, said: "While we can be measuring statistics like number of litters, number of defects and maintenance and so on I think it's very important to relate to the residents.

"I think the linkage between town councils and the residents is important to establish. So we would encourage town councils to establish that bond and rapport and establish the expectations of residents."

Here's how estates could be measured:

- On cleanliness, it could be the amount of litter found.

- On maintenance, it could be the number of defects or how often lift breakdowns occur.

- On financial management, it could be tracking arrears in Service and Conservancy charges.

Instead of being ranked, town councils will be banded according to how well they perform against the indicators spelt out. Results of the assessment will be made public.

Associate Professor Yu Shi Ming, head of department, Real Estate, National University of Singapore, said: "The report should not be viewed as one which compares one with another. So if one town council gets a better score then they are better managed than the other one. It should be used as a gauge on how they are performing and also perhaps it's something they can learn from each town council."

A team from the Housing and Development Board will be appointed to conduct the assessment.

There are 16 town councils across Singapore. Together they manage some 900,000 flats. 14 are run by the ruling PAP and two by the opposition - the Workers' Party in Hougang and the Singapore People's Party in Potong Pasir.

The assessment would apply to both PAP and opposition wards.