Good news. The council’s damp survey will go ahead as soon as it is safe to do so. We need your feedback on the design.
The council’s current thoughts are
the survey will look at all blocks on the estate in relation to common parts. We will also require access to restricted areas, such as roofs, bin stores, riser cupboards (where safe to do so), etc. to ensure that the survey is as comprehensive as possible. As previously mentioned the survey will also incorporate a sample of the flats affected by damp and mould. Initially the sample will be from flats where there are known problems. The intention is to sample approx. 34 flats. This might be less or more depending on access. From experience, it is also likely that during the actual inspections certain things will be noted which may lead to attempts to gain access to other flats to seek answers.
Under normal circumstances we would call a public meeting to discuss this. Obviously it’s not safe to do it now. So we need to do consultation some other way
If you have some thoughts on this survey please
- Contact us. We’ll collate the thoughts then arrange a meeting with Cllr Paul Gadsby. He had agreed to meet us before the Corona Virus hit
- Post your thoughts to our facebook group. Then other people can see them and discuss them.
- If you’re affected by damp join our WhatsApp group and post your thoughts there.
We have our survey. Now we need to make sure it’s the right survey.
UPDATE: We’ve now heard from someone from Community Organisers who’s been in contact with similar campaigns. He said any surveyor who’s a member of the Royal Institute for Chartered Surveyors (which in practice means every surveyor) will follow RICS procedure and do a good job. He also said it is good practice to internal surveys only on affected blocks – there’s only a finite amount of resource to do internal surveys and you want to do it in places the maximises the chance you’ll find something. So I think the procedure outlined by the council is good. But if anyone has any other contacts that might be able to contact on it please contact us
St Martins TRA 