CEO ‘s Report

I am well pleased with our progress to date.

At a Governance level we have entrenched the separation of Governance from operations whilst being able to initiate discussions at mangers level of key policy directives before it was considered and approved by the Board of Management. Increasingly clients are involved together with staff and shelter committees in determining the service levels with the recognition amongst participants that decisions will ultimately be made by the Board of Management and or shelter committees after these inclusive consultations.

Operationally The Haven Night Shelter Welfare Organisation is becoming increasingly more efficient in the utilisation of resources to goal directed programmes. Temporary shelter is important and necessary for what we do. However it is incidental to our goal of getting people home. Our efforts should be to getting individuals to a point where they can make decisions about changing their individual lives. Only clients with no other options should be in our shelters. Developmental, goal directed activities are the right that our funders and supporters have over us. We recognise that it is more cost efficient to provide the means to go home than to provide shelter to a person and it frees a bed and rehabilitation opportunity for a person who requires it. 

Increasingly we see the merits of specialisation. One size fits all does not work. Individual plans developed with the person have a greater chance of success. We have concluded that each shelter should have the services of a social worker to maximise the rehabilitative and developmental role that we occupy in this sector. In addition the Haven Shelters recognising that we are great at some things are increasingly outsource training and work placements to our social partners like Men on the Side of The Road and other institutions who are good at what they do.

Cost reduction is another goal for the year ahead. We have managed to reduce the

expenditure on electricity and water from R487 836 to R431 693 in spite of tariff increases. I must commend the Haven staff for their diligence in this regard. We are working to reduce this even further.

The Provincial Department of Social Services is still the biggest contributor to The Haven Night Shelter Welfare Organisation through the Grant in Aid support mechanism. We also acknowledge the contributions of The City of Cape Town, Swartland Municipality, The Lotto, The Heart of The Haven and the many individuals. Trusts and companies who support our efforts. The contributions of food from the supermarkets and the local communities enable us to reduce the cost of feeding our clients and enable us to improve the food security of the communities in which we find ourselves. We in turn supply of our excess food to soup kitchens, schools and families in the neighbouring communities.

We are pleased with the progress of our model rehabilitation and poverty alleviation centre. The Haven Utility Company and the National Lotteries Distribution Agency (Lotto) are co-funding this project. We expect this shelter to become a model for future shelters.

I would like to thank the managers, supervisors and social workers for their co-operation and support in the operational field.

A word of thanks to the various Shelter Committee members, The Board of Management and in particular Mr. Philip Bam and Mr. Graeme Laithwaite for their support, advice and guidance. I really appreciate all your efforts in making The Haven Night Shelter Welfare Organisation the leading Organisation in our sector.

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