Overstrand Executive Mayor, Dr Annelie Rabie, decided to have public meetings in Wards 5, 6 and 12 in Hermanus after receiving complaints from these communities regarding the unavailability of electricity and the consistent vandalism of electrical infrastructure.

The meetings were held on 12, 13 and 15 September 2022 and her message was consistent in all three meetings that the unavailability of electricity to those residents who have legal electricity connections was a direct result of the vandalism and subsequent failure of the electrical infrastructure due to illegal connections.

In the previous month, the Municipality suffered the loss of a number of transformers, which were completely destroyed by unscrupulous individuals, who for self-gain, break open transformer doors to illegally connect to the network. 

Overstrand Municipality's Local Economic Development Department (LED) partnered with the ASISA Foundation to help micro-enterprises manage their business and personal finances better through the Financial Literacy and Micro-Enterprise (FLAME) programme.

This is a 15-month hands-on programme for micro business owners, looking to understand personal and business finances and to gain business knowledge to start, run and grow their businesses.

The Owners of the business must be:

The Hermanus Botanical Society are working with Overberg Arborists on a project to propagate from trees in the botanical gardens at the entrance of the Fernkloof Nature Reserve, using a non-invasive air layering process.

Air layering is a method of propagating new trees and shrubs from stems still attached to the parent plant.

Hikers and people visiting the gardens, may notice little tin foil parcels hanging from some of the fruiting trees. The arborists are hopeful that in three months’ time, they will have grown a root ball so that the twig or small branch can then be transplanted and grown. 

Successes will be shared with the stakeholders at the end of the process on a 50/50 basis. The new sprouts can be used in the Nursery or in the Garden.

The Gansbaai Library opened its doors to the public on 3 September 1969 - making it 53 years old this year.

They started off with a membership of 63 adults and 112 children and circulated 2 131 library books.

Fast forward to today, Gansbaai Public Library has a membership of 2 670 patrons and circulates over 54 000 items a year.

And of course, it wouldn't be a birthday party without cake! To mark this special day, the staff and patrons celebrated with delicious slices of birthday cake.

The library is well supported by the community. Operating hours are Mondays to Thursdays from 09:00 - 17:00 and Fridays from 09:00 - 16:30.