Chow Kon Yeow: 曹观友

Adopt a green lung areas
By CHRISTINA CHIN
TO encourage the corporate sector to help beautify Penang, companies will be allowed to advertise their company names in their respective “adopted areas”.

State Local Government, Traffic Management and Environment Committee chairman Chow Kon Yeow said the companies would be allowed to advertise in return for sponsorship and corporate adoption programmes.

“The move has proven to be an effective and efficient way to reduce local councils’ landscaping and beautification cost,” he said.

Chow said it was not feasible to plant flowers that incur huge monthly maintenance cost.

Green haven: Cheap and easy to maintain plants and trees will be planted at spots like Gurney Drive.

“What we need are more trees and plants that are cheaper to plant,” he said in an interview.

When contacted, Consumers Association of Penang (CAP) president S.M. Mohd Idris said the state should rethink the private sponsorship and corporate adoption programmes.

“It does not cost a lot to ‘green up’ Penang. In 1963, I was in the local council and we initiated a tree-planting campaign that was very successful.

“We do not need the private sector because it does not cost much to plant trees. Until today, the trees still stand – look at the Peel Avenue, Jalan Masjid Ne-geri and Macalister Road stretches. The local councils should also consider bougainvillea shrubs and other creepers that are cheap, pretty and easy to maintain,” he said, adding that beautification should be the “people’s project”.

“Get everyone involved. Get students to plant trees outside their school compounds, encou-rage homeowners to plant trees outside their gardens and urge corporations to do the same in their surroundings.

“When it comes to planting trees, everyone should be allowed to do so even if it is on state land. So long as the trees and plants do not obstruct traffic and pose a danger to road users, it should be allowed,” he said.

Idris also warned that allowing the private sector to advertise in return for sponsorship could lead to “ugly, obstructive and distracting advertisements” mushrooming everywhere.

Saturday April 5, 2008
Repair cracks, builder told
By NG SU-ANN
THE Penang Municipal Coun-cil has directed a developer to repair the cracks on some 10 houses in Changkat Bukit Gambir which appeared after it started work on a nearby apartment project last year.

State Local Government, Traffic Management and Environment Committee chairman Chow Kon Yeow said the council would not hesitate to issue a stop work order if the developer did not comply with the requirements.

“The developer should have taken a more pro-active stance to repair the cracks and not wait for the residents to complain to us before doing something about it,” he told newsmen at the Vista Gambir construction site yesterday.

The visit came in the wake of several complaints from the nearby residents concerning the cracks as well as noise and dust pollution caused by the developer’s rock blasting work at the site.

Condo site:A view of Vista Gambier apartment project near Jalan Bukit Gambier.

Chow said the complainants were also concerned that their access road would be used by the apartment’s residents upon the project’s completion.

“They fear this will result in traffic congestion,” he said, adding that there were about 50 houses in the neighbourhood.

Council president Datuk Zainal Rahim Seman said: “If the developer doesn’t repair (the cracks), we will repair them.”

A company spokesman, who only wanted to be known as Cheah, said they would begin repairing the houses as soon as possible.

On the rock blasting, he said it had been completed.

Vista Gambier is a 19-storey condominium block with two wings comprising 144 units.

The project is expected to be completed at the end of next year.

Wednesday April 2, 2008
Penang to appoint independent auditor
By K. KASTURI DEWI

PENANG: An independent auditor will be appointed to look into the financial status of state government agencies and departments, with the Seberang Prai Municipal Council (MPSP) topping the list.

Chief Minister Lim Guan Eng said the decision was made at Wednesday’s state exco meeting.

“We need a reputable accounting firm to handle the auditing of these agencies and departments, including the MPSP which has been running on a deficit budget for years,'’ he said after chairing the state exco meeting.

On Tuesday, State Local Government Committee chairman Chow Kon Yeow disclosed that the MPSP was down to “its last few millions”, adding that the state government had to find a way to finance the council or it would run into financial difficulties by year-end.

With an accumulated deficit of RM226mil over the last eight years, the MPSP had been scraping the bottom of the barrel to keep operations afloat.

Chow had said the council had a reserve of RM229mil in 2000 but was left with only RM25.6mil at the end of 2007.

Speech as the State Local Government Committee chairman during the Viewing of Golden Sands Resort’s Recycling Initiative on Friday, 28th March, 2008.

Congratulations to Golden Sands Resort and the Penang Environment Working Group (PEWOG) for carrying out this recycling programme.
Your “waste to wealth” recycling programme has collected 17 tonnes of recyclable materials which has contributed RM7,000 to the resort’s Green Fund since December 2007.
It is important for all of us to take part in recycling.
Today, our environment is threatened by the big load of rubbish which our society is generating everyday. This rubbish has to be disposed off and it is costing the government and the rate payers a big sum of money because the process of rubbish disposal is getting more costly.
The island of Penang produces 800 tonnes of rubbish daily and at RM110 per tonne, inclusive of the cost of collection, transport, transfer of rubbish by barge from Batu Maung on the island to the landfill in Pulau Burung in Seberang Prai Selatan, rubbish disposal in the island costs us RM88,000 per day or RM2.64 million a month.
The average cost of disposal of 1,000 tonne of rubbish a day in Seberang Prai, inclusive of collection, transport and transfer of rubbish from Ampang Jajar to Pulau Burung is RM70 per tonne or RM70,000 a day or RM2.1 million a month.
The total waste disposal cost of 1,800 tonnes of rubbish per day for the state of Penang is RM158,000 per day or RM4.74 million per month.
Through recycling, we can reduce the amount of rubbish which ends up in our landfill.
If we can all put in our effort to recycle our rubbish, we can reduce the volume of rubbish in the state by 30 per cent of 540 tonnes a day.
At an average cost of RM88 per tonne for both Penang island and Seberang Prai, we can save RM47.520 a day or RM1.425 million a month.
This waste management cost will increase with time, as cost of fuel, labour and maintenance and replacement of equipment increases.
Cost savings through recycling and waste diversion from the landfill will mean that our assessment rates need not be increased to meet the rising cost of waste management and that our two municipal councils can channel more money into better public facilities and services.
I am glad that todate, the recycling rate in Penang island today is 15 per cent and the rate in Seberang Prai is 18 per cent, compared to the national average of 4.5 per cent.
We need to increase this rate to 30 per cent, to effect greater savings in our waste management costs.
In this consideration then, the recycling initiative in Golden Sands Resort is an encouraging addition to the effort of the State Government, through our two municipal councils and the Penang Environment Working Group (Pewog), to increase our recycling rate in Penang to 30 per cent.
I believe that if we all work together, we shall be able to achieve this recycling target.
I hope that recycling initiative of the Golden Sands Resort will become a catalyst to recycling programmes in all hotels in Penang.
Considering what Golden Sands Resort has achieved in such a short time - 16 tonnes in three months or 5.3 tonnes per month - we can picture what recycling in all our Penang hotels can do for our state’s recycling effort.
There indeed is truly a big scope for recycling in Penang’s hotels.
I hope that the Malaysian Association of Hotels, Penang Chapter, can take up recycling as a special project and promote it amongst all your members.
There is also the added incentive of being able to raise funds for your staff welfare and your favourite charities.
I wish to once again thank Golden Sands Resort and PEWOG for inviting me to this Viewing of Golden Sands Resprt’s recycling initiative.
I wish you every success in your recycling programme. Thank you.

Last Saturday, Danny Law accompanied me to Yeap Chor Ee Road, Penang to hear the woes of residents who were affected by the new condominium project. Below is a report in the Star Metro North page.

Rock blasting causing mini quakes

By TAN SIN CHOW

MORE than 200 residents of Cangkat Bukit Gambir 2 and Mutiara Ria Apartment in Penang claim they have been experiencing mini “earthquakes” for the past two weeks due to rock blasting activities at a nearby housing project.

Engineer B.G. Lee, in his 30s, said the earth-work for the construction of a 19-storey con-dominium started about one month ago, with rock blasting to flatten a hillock being carried out between 4.30pm and 5.30pm on week-days.

“We can feel the tremor from each blast,” he said, adding that signboards of rock blasting were only put up two days ago.

He questioned whether the Penang Muni-cipal Council had considered the residents’ safety before approving the project some six months ago.

Another resident, Dr Narvair Singh, 36, said he could no longer bring his five-year-son out for a stroll in the evening for fear of being hit by flying stones. The housing area had also be-come very dusty.

“I have to close all the windows in the house to prevent stones from raining in. The vibration has caused some hairline cracks on my house ceiling, resulting in water seepage,” he said.

Another resident, who wished to identified only as Leow, said she
was not given any no-tice prior to the rock blasting.

“We should have been consulted,” she added.

Tanjung MP Chow Kon Yeow, who inspec-ted the site on Saturday, said the residents were not given an opportunity to raise objec-tions against the project as provided for under the Town and Country Planning Act 1976 (Act 172).

Chow also urged the council to supervise earthworks at the site regularly.

When contacted, a spokesman for the deve-loper said the blasting was carried out within the permissible level.

He added that the company would carry out repair works if the cracks in some of the houses were genuinely caused by the blasting.

I was driving along Green Lane early this morning. It was cool and breezy.

The scene before me was beautiful. Little yellow petals were falling from the many trees lining Green Lane. It is the time of the year where flowers from trees bloom and start falling after a few weeks. It is like snowing. Yellow petals were everywhere.

I remember in the early eighties, the flame of the forest in the USM Minden campus were so beautiful. The red petals were scattered around the trees and it was such a beautiful sight.

I was captivated by those big trees along Green Lane and Macalister Road. Maybe this is why I chose to stay back in Penang after graduating from USM in 1984.

We know these trees are real old, some more than 50 years old and still beautiful.

The former generation planted the trees and we the present generation enjoy the shades and beauty.

We should be planting trees today not chopping them off.

Can Ong Ka Theng give us a report on the tree-planting campaign launched by his Housing and Local Government Ministry several years ago?

IT has become the norm for Penangites these days to put up structures first before applying for approval.

Tanjung MP Chow Kon Yeow said the problem of illegal structures was “everywhere in town'’ which indicated that the council was weak in its enforcement.

“Many resort to putting up illegal structures because of the frustration of having to wait a year or two for approval due to red tape,” he said.

He added that it was time for the council to make the approval process shorter.

Chow was commenting on the glass box-like side entrance to the Tanjung Umno division building on Bishop Street. The council has issued a notice to the owner to demolish the illegal extension or get council approval. (more…)