When I went out about 0940 this morning, I encountered this rubbish on the 3rd and 2nd floors by the rubbish chutes. I put my rubbish down the 3rd floor rubbish chute just before making this video clip. While the 3rd floot rubbish chute could be used, the 2nd floor rubbish chute was unusable forcing well intentioned tenants to put their rubbish on the floor.
Video clip of rubbish stacked on floor by the 3rd & 2nd floor rubbish chutes next to front door.
When I returned about 1100, I found the front door propped opwn by those carrying out works so that they can enter and leave easily. This constitutes a serious security risk in a high crime area. Despite having addressed this problem at least twice before recently by Email, it persists. In fact, I found the front door propped open like this when I left after one of the works guys was standing outside waiting for a mate. They both came inside before I finished making the above video clip.
I did not film the front door when departing but only removed the pieces of wood to shut and lock it. There were three guys in white shirts and ties coming up the front footpath as I did so. It turned out later after my return that one of them was Keith Stevenson (see below). This means that during the hour and twenty minutes I was out, these guys from Estate management were here, and the works guys propped the door open once again which I found upon my return.
Also in this video clip whose link is below, the rubbish can be seen along the railing of the 3rd floor above next to that rubbish chute. There is a sign above the front door requesting "Please Do Not Feed the Pigeons" in large letters. Then there is a comment about prosecuting those who do. Here's the front door being propped open so that pigeons and any other vermin can come in and have a feast on the rubbish. The pigeons proliferate searching for food constantly outside the building. While this sign prohibiting the feeding of pigeons under penalty of prosecution is displayed prominently, the question comes up about who is accountable and responsible for the rubbish on the floor and the front door propped open?
Blaming tenants is a convenient management scapegoat for evading responsibility and accountability for the deliberate disregard of security, safety and health in which the Estate management indulges.
Video clip of front door propped open and rubbish above on the 3rd floor by its rubbish chute. Note the "Do Not Feed the Pigeons" sign above the front door.
You will note some differences between the above video clip of the rubbish on the floo and these still photographs which were taken an hour and twenty minutes later because rubbish continues to be added to the heap on each floor. It is important to point out that when I first asked Keith Stevenson who he was with, he replied "The Council." I was surprised about this claim. As I continued talking with him, it became obvious that he was with the Estate Management Board which was printed on his shirt and badge which he showed me to provide his position and name. Then I remembered him but had not recognised him initially.
The question arises as to why is he claiming to be an employee of the Council? This is quite a serious representation in these circumstances since it relates to the Arms Length Management Organisation (ALMO) status of the Tenant Management Organisation (TMO) which is currently subject to the Audit Commission inspection validation this month. The Lancaster West Estate Management Board (EMB) repudiates any affiliation with the Tenant Management Organisation (TMO) claiming accurately that it has a contract directly with the Council to manage the Lancaster West Estate. This might very well be why Keith Stevenson was claiming to work for the Council.
This management conflict accounts for a significant amount of the management problems which I am describing, and the idea of an Arms Length Management Organisation (ALMO) is nonexistant for 9% of the Council's housing stock which the TMO claims for its own as an ALMO. The TMO has legal responsibilty but no power. The EMB has power but no legal responsiblity. My tenancy agreement is with the TMO, but it's the EMB who makes the decisions. The EMB is not legally accountable and responsible with respect to the tenancy agreement. The EMB and the TMO are both creatures of the Council who created each one and maintains each one as separate organisations. Some TMO employees are seconded to the EMB, but they are subjected to EMB decisions. This abrogates any notion of an ALMO status for the TMO as Keith Stevenons indicated to me by claiming to work for the Council. He ultimately works for the Council and does not recognise the TMO.
When we were discussing the rubbish problem with its being on the floor as described below, he agreed with me when I pointed out that this was a daily problem. He also confirmed that he had seen me departing and removing the bits of wood from under the front door when I was departing while he was arriving.
The rubbish chute doors are too small for the larger bags in this environment with a total of some 60 residential units in this section of Hurstway Walk many of them duplex flats with multi bedrooms for large families. This rubbish acccumulation constitutes a safty and health threat. It's a safety threat from the risk of fire. It's a health threat from bacteria growing in this rubbish which gets dumped on the floor, picked up on people's feet and tracked into homes. It attracts vermin who have a nightly feed on this excellent food supply. When it is excessively hot as it is this week, all these problems and risk are compounded and accentuated including the fact that the central heating remains on throughout the summer. Vermin proliferate in this tropical rubbish dump environment.
Keith Stevenson, Lancaster West Estate Management Board (EMB) Superintendent/Supervisor whom I met while returning just before taking the photos claimed that the rubbish pick up for yesterday did not occur in Hurstway Road below where these rubbish chutes feed into a large bin there. That's trying to blame others for a tenant management failure. I always thought that the rubbish pickup was today, but whatever the situation I put my rubbish down the chute above on the third floor a little while earlier with no problems. What happens is that people just put the rubbish in the safety doors and leave it. Others come along, think they are blocked and put their rubbish on the floor. Eventually the rubbish chute door becomes completely inaccessible.
Tenant management will not enlarge the rubbish chute doors because they claim it is a safety hazard for the children, yet they have left the safety doors on the floor for months in the past when they are broken when the cleaners put the large bags down the chutes. The safety doors just give way under the repeated strain, are removed and set aside. It is possible to enlarge these openings, put them at a higher level and install a safety door in the larger opening for child safety. The Council/Tenant Management just do not want to spend the money and effort to do this. If there was a genuine concern about the health and safety of children, something would be done about the hazard which results from dumping the rubbish on the floors. The children play in the Walkway continuously and can pick up the bacteria from the floor in this area. These areas are just inside the front door along the direct route to the front door, and bacteria growth can be right on the path to the front door.
Keith Stevenson said these were the best in the Council. If that is true, the Council has a serious problem. He blames the tenants for the problem when it is clearly a rubbish disposal problem. Many years ago c 1998 the Chief Executive of the Council sent me a letter stating the policy with regard to rubbish disposal after I had been addressing this problem with rat infestation which was in the news at that time. A letter of mine had been published in The Guardian about this matter pointing a finger at the recalcitrant Council. He described the fact that child safety prevented them from enlarging the chute openings. Further, the Council's Chief Executive stated that residents could put rubbish bags on the floor with proper ties if they were too big to go through the safety door and down the chute. He said that these would then be collected. This was adopted by the Lancaster West Estate Management Board as a policy for disposing off rubbish acknowledging the fact that the rubbish chutes were inadequate.
Keith Stevenson told me this morning that they (EMB) were not responsible for taking care of the tenants rubbish disposal. They have been putting it down the chutes for years on behalf of the tenants. A policy was established almost a decade ago to allow the rubbish to be put on the floor and then be picked up by the cleaners who would put the rubbish down the chutes. Keith Stevenson is dodging responsibility. Well, who is responsible for providing adequate rubbish disposal facilities? This is an issue which is long over due for discussion. This currently looks like typical tenant management game playing.
It is not the tenants who are at fault here. This is a convenient scapegoat for tenant management who does not want to be bothered with this problem and would rather leave the rubbish on the floor to be picked up by the cleaners daily and put down the rubbish chutes. The established policy of allowing large bags to be placed on the floor simply attracts others to dump bags of all sizes onto the floor as well. The tenants have been trained by tenant management to put the rubbish on the floor and that is what occurs for the most part for all sizes of bags and all kinds of rubbish.
This then creates the kind of situation which is seen here. Tenant management has even claimed that they would go through the bags of rubbish to identify who was putting the rubbish on the floor. This has never been done. It was just a ruse to get people to accept a bad manangement policy and a contradictory one in essence with regard to the size of the bag involved. Who's going to determine what constitutes a bag too large? Tenant management would rather build 38 business units over the past several years at a cost of over one million GBP rather than address the rubbish disposal problem which goes on daily and has been present for many, many years adversely impacting the lives of thousands of residents.
They rationalise reasons as to why to disregard the rubbish disposal problems so that the few at the top can benefit from doing other things while all the residents of this 900 or so residential units on the Estate are forced to live in a daily rubbish heap with the central heating on all summer. Then they try to cover it up by having a cleaner come around at 5:00 to 6:00 am or even earlier to put the night's rubbish accummulation down the rubbish chutes accompanied by a noise so loud that it constitutes a nuisance and wakes me. I describe filming this actvity in my complaint letter to the Audit Commission dated 6th June 2006 which is published below.
Surveillance technology is being used against me to stop me from addressing these problems in order the cover them up and pretend that they do not exist. Rubbish disposal was one of the key issues being addressed at the time the surveillance technology was installed in August 1998 and placed at the disposal of the tenants, residents and others. My balcony disrepair had just occurred at that time too. Let 'me sweat in the rubbish and the rubble was what they actually did, and it continues today along with the surveilanct techology abuse. It is obvious that surveillance technology is abused for the purpose of silencing me and driving me out or have me removed bsed upon false allegations since this rubbish disposal problem and others are daily ones and have been for most of the ten years of my residency along with my balcony disrepair and central heating left on during the summers.
---------- Forwarded Message ----------
Subject: Front Door Security; Rubbish Disposal and the Ongoing Surveillance Technology Driven Harassment Agaisnt Me
Date: Tuesday 18 July 2006 12:39
From: Gary D Chance
To: "Damian Donnelly
Damian Donnelly
Area Manager TMO/EMB
Lancaster West Estate
Grenfell Tower
Dear Mr Donnelly
1. The front door was propped open twice this morning on my exit to go shopping and on my return. Each time I removed the objects propping it open.
On my exit there were three men in white shirts and badges arriving. One of them turned out to be Keith Stevenson whom I saw at the front door area upon my return. He said that he would take care of the security problem and had been addressing it earlier with correspondence noting that they had been putting screws in to keep the front door open. He said he would send another letter.
I made a video clip of the front door propped open on my return.
2. The rubbish was stacked on both floors with the rubbish chute filled on the second floor preventing its usage. I had a very brief discussion with Keith Stevenson about this which I will detail later. He said he would address it, and there was a cleaner with him.
I made a video clip of the third and second floor rubbish stacked around the rubbish chute doors on my exit. On my return I made still photographs of this rubbish which was still present after my discussion about it with Keith Stevenson.
3. The abuse from ********* and Lt Harry Bird continues unabated this morning as usual and through all of this. I had described the some eight years of surveillance used against me to Keith Stevenson while we were talking about the rubbish problem when he suggested that I join the [EMB] "committee."
I explained that my reputation had been destroyed by the use of the surveillance technology; that I had been isolated and alienated by its usage which prevented any such participation on the "committee"; and that such usage was carried out to attack me while making complaints about all these problems in order to prevent me from doing so.
This is a significant issue which goes back to June 1996 directly involving Keith Stevenson which I will detail shortly. It was Keith Stevenson who showed me my flat in May 1996, and at that time he noted that the rubbish was being put on the floor.
Once again Linda and Lt Harry Bird were attacking me for addressing these problems after I returned to the flat with their continuous false allegations and incitement
. This once again confirmed the point that I had made to Keith Stevenson about the surveillance being used against me for unlawful and criminal purposes during the past eight years. Tenant management has been a full participant in this activity from its inception in August 1998 onwards.
I found it outrageous that Keith Stevenson should suggest that I join the "committee" with regard to the rubbish on the floor problem and told him that everyone knew about the surveillance implying that he must certainly know as well.
This is consistent with these issues I raised starting in June 1996 when such blackmail by failure to provide security and safety and health standards was used to drive people to participate in tenant management.
This happened in June 1996, and now it happens in similar circumstances with the same person ten years later. I thought it policy then and see that this is confirmed once again today.
4. This morning once again there were a series of events connected with those using the surveillance technology which I will describe when I have had time to verify the evidence which I collected at the time. When ********* sees me documenting the problems as I had to do once again this morning, she attacks with a false allegation that is cruel, inhuman and degrading.
This then continued with Lt Harry Bird joining in followed by incitements directed at others to carry out unlawful and criminal acts on their behalf against me based upon these fabricated allegations. They are using the surveillance technology to observe what I am doing then attacking me when they do not like what I do such as reporting the problems which are occurring.
5. I wanted to send you a quick summary while it is fresh in my mind about these issues since they are all quite important, interrelated and form a consistent pattern of behaviour so that you will know what is going on and the fact that Keith Stevenson is addressing the problems.
However diligent he might be by his own description, and I have no doubt in believing him, something is missing because these problems are happening repeatedly including the front door being propped open twice this morning in the middle of the presence of these three people all wearing white shirts and badges one of whom turned out to be Keith Stevenson.
Security must be maintained in this building and cannot be allowed to lapse. Safety and health must be maintained at the basic level of acceptable standards and cannot be allowed to lapse.
I don't need to say much more about why I was forced to cancel this afternoon's heating control valve replacement as a result of this continuous harassment from those using the surveillance technology as a weapon amid problems of security, safety and health which they seek to prevent me from addressing.
It's fortunate that I've been acclimatised to very hot weather all my life. Heat or cold never bothers me as long as I deal with the extremes properly.
However, no one is acclimatised to the brutal and lethal use of surveillance technology. This must be stopped by others and takes top priority for me. I cannot do otherwise for it is the most significant and very real threat against my life.
*****End of the Email*****
Here's a copy of my recent complaint to the Audit Commission dated 6th June 2006 with regard to the inspection carried out three years ago and the inspecion taking place this month. It deals with the problems described above including the surveillance techology abuse among numerous other problems reflecting tenant management failure and abuse.
From:
Gary D Chance
[Address Details Omitted]
http://garydchance.bravejournal.com
http://garydchance.tripod.com/surveillance
Tuesday, 6th June 2006
To:
Complaints Unit Manager
Audit Policy and Appointments
Audit Commission
Westward House, Lime Kiln Close
Stoke Gifford, Bristol, BS34 By Post and Email (without enclosures)
Dear Sir or Madam
Re Royal Borough Kensington & Chelsea Tenant Management Organisation July 2006 Inspection and July 2003 Inspection Failures
This correspondence deals with a complaint about the failures with regard to a Housing Inspectorate inspection in the summer of 2003 with the same fundamental tenant management problems not only continuing but escalating to a quite serious threat to the safety and health of the tenants and residents of the Lancaster West Estate in North Kensington.
I will be sending a copy of this correspondence without its enclosures by Email in addition to this hard copy with enclosures and signatures so that you can electronically deal with its contents as you see fit forwarding it to whomever you wish. Since this is a complaint about the failures of the 2003 audit inspection and provides guidance to the persisting problems for the forthcoming 2006 audit inspection, I will be sending it along to other recipients to ensure that these matters are properly addressed this time to prevent a further threat to life and property which persists.
Fundamental essence of tenant management at the Lancaster West Estate in North Kensington:
1. Decisions are not made in the overall interest of the tenants and residents but are made in the interest of those in control of the several tenant management organisations:
a. 38 business units were constructed in the Barandon Road under Barandon Walk at a cost in excess of one million GBP the planning for which and its implementation/construction was underway in 2003.
b. Central heating remained on during the summers throughout the some 900 unit Lancaster West Estate for years including the summer of 2003 and since.
c. Rubbbish disposal facilities inadequacy has not been addressed but covered up as has been occurring for years and persists to the present. See the attached Emails for a description of this problem which was brought to the attention of the Housing Inspectorate by me in May 2003.
2. Coverup has been the consistent policy of tenant management instead of proper management sincerely and effectively addressing the safety and health issues which put lives and property at risk. Coverup for image management purposes is a consistent policy of the various tenant management organisations including the brutal suppression of those like myself who raise the critically important problems to try to properly address and solve them.
a. I recently sent a letter to the 22 TMO Board Members/Directors to bring to their attention this problem and the failures of management which accrue to the TMO as a result of the failure of its management. I received a letter from the TMO Company Secretary attempting to block any direct correspondence to the TMO Directors stating that he had instructed the Directors not to engage in any correspondence with me and to forward any letters from me to the TMO Chief Executive. This would enable him to carry on with his coverup activity while denying the Directors their legal responsibilities.
b. During the heat wave of early August 2003 coincident with the inspection/audit when it was later learned that 2,000 deaths had been attributable to it, I sent letters to the Leader of the Council and the TMO Chief Executive including a second notice that the central heating was turned on. I received no reply and included this problem in more correspondence at the beginning of September 2003. Finally, I received a reply in October 2003 which was useless.
i. Once again in late June 2005 there was a heat wave while the central heating was turned on during the summer. This had continued during the summer of 2004 as well. This time in 2005 I contacted BBC London following a morning TV news bulletin which asked people to respond about how they were coping with the heat. I did so and got a response.
(1) The plumber showed up at my door and turned off the valve showing me how to do so. He explained that an unknown number of flats in the Lancaster West Estate had this fault. This was not effective, and the heat was not shut off in my flat.
(2) A couple days later the very first and only communication was sent out by the then Estate Officer advising tenants about this heating problem noting that engineers were addressing it.
(3) Since the central heat remained on, I had a further telephone conversation with the plumber at the end of August 2005 indicating that repair alternatives were being considered but no decision had been made by tenant management about addressing this problem.
(4) Also in August 2005 a meter reader who entered my flat asked why it was so hot. I explained. He said that all the flats were like this, and the water was excessively hot as well.
(5) More recently another meter reader entered my flat for that purpose and again noted that it was extremely hot in here.
(6) For the past year since early July 2005, I’ve maintained a temperature and humidity logging device recording these readings every 30 minutes. These are then produced as a graph from its database.
ii. Nothing was mentioned in the Lancaster West Estate Newsletter received in October 2005 about this central heating problem. Instead, there were four pages dedicated to the opening of the 38 business units in Barandon Road under Barandon Walk where the Lancaster West EMB Chair resides. He had also provided a religious dissertation on the entire first page of this newsletter. It was obvious that time, attention and resources were being dedicated to the personal interests of those with decision making responsibility while nothing was being done to address serious safety and health hazards impacting all the tenants and especially not discussing these in the newsletter.
c. The inadequate rubbish disposal facilities have been covered up instead of addressed since 1997. A local Environmental Health inspection at that time was subject to such coverup which enabled tenant management to continue with this safety and health abuse. This is described in the attached Emails as well.
i. Just this past week I documented on film on three separate occasions this coverup in action confirming beyond any doubt that coverup was the policy of tenant management which has been in existence since 1997.
(1) On Bank Holiday Monday, 29th May 2006 at 6:11 am, I filmed a Lancaster West Estate contract/employee putting the rubbish down the rubbish chute by the front door. This had been left on the floor all night. The safety and health hazard from such dumping of rubbish persists overnight while the bags were put down early in the morning to hide the fact of their existence to prevent me and anyone else from noting and documenting them as I did. This has been going on for years, and I’ve heard explicit instructions given to the apparent cleaner to arrive earlier to put this rubbish down the rubbish chutes.
(a) I notified tenant management about this event and the evidence obtained by me.
(2) On Thursday, 1st June 2006, I filmed this same activity before and after it had happened again following my notification to tenant management about this coverup. At 5:47 am I photographed the rubbish on the floor next to the second and third floor rubbish chutes by the front door. After I heard noises of this rubbish being put down the rubbish chutes once again followed by filming the same contract/employee departing the front door entrance at 6:23 am, I filmed the area around these rubbish chutes at 6:27 am. There were bits of paper and a white liquid remaining on the floor. Thus, I was able to film the before and after of this safety and health hazard coverup including the same person filmed departing who had been filmed earlier doing it.
(a) I once again notified tenant management about this latest incident and its evidence.
(3) Finally, on Saturday, 3rd June 2006 at 5:16 am, I once again filmed the rubbish chute areas after the all night rubbish on the floor had been put noisily down the rubbish chute an hour earlier than before to escape detection and my evidence collection. What remained were large items and a great deal of liquid on the floor from the rubbish bags. While I was filming the second floor rubbish chute area by the front door with the liquid, the rubbish was being put down a chute in the next section of Hurstway Walk at this early hour and could be clearly heard which was recorded on the video clip sound track. This activity moves from section to section in these Walks putting the rubbish on the floor down the chutes. There was no doubt about this being a deliberate coverup advancing the time an hour earlier with the apparent involvement of a nearby tenant this time after I notified tenant management twice earlier this past week about this activity which also causes a noise nuisance at this extremely early hour. Efforts were made by tenant management to continue the safety and health hazard coverup with attempts to evade detection and evidence collection such as I was doing.
d. The surveillance technology used against me to destroy human activity and life itself 24/7 for the past eight years in the hands of the tenants and others as part of tenant management is going on as of this writing by making every effort to stop me from reporting this maladministration and gross mismanagement. This is a prime example of the ultimate coverup. What I described in my correspondence to you three years ago continues. In fact, it was this extremely abusive activity concentrating on chronic sleep deprivation which woke me early in the morning resulting in my documentation of the rubbish safety and health coverup described above.
i. I’ve included two additional copies of Emails to the Prime Minister concerning my cataract surgery during the summer of 2003 following my correspondence to you in May 2003. The cataract surgery and the heat wave occurred during your inspection that summer. The cataracts were a direct result of the use of the surveillance technology against me since August 1998. The continuing abuse by those using the surveillance technology surrounding the cataract surgery is described in this correspondence which was serious enough to send to the Prime Minister. The all around cost implications for the Government should be of deep concern to the Audit Commission.
ii. Cataract surgery occurred in one eye at a time at the beginning of June 2003 and near the end of July 2003. There is about a six week recovery period for each eye. During the summer of 2003, this was adversely impacted not only by the abuse of surveillance technology against me but by the fact that the central heating remained on at the same time as the excessive and deadly heat wave occurred in early August after the cataract surgery on my second eye. Every effort was made by those using the surveillance technology to damage my surgery recovery process hoping to destroy my eyesight throughout this summer.
e. Operating and parking motor vehicles (motor scooters and motor bikes) on the Estate footpaths continues as of this writing as it did almost a decade ago in 1997 despite continuous efforts to address this problem. In 1997 those connected with tenant management who resided in this area felt free to operate and park their motor bikes on the Estate footpaths even after signs prohibiting this were posted. In fact, the only offender following the posting of these signs in the Pen area out front was someone from the flat above me directly connected with tenant management. He parked his Harley Davison directly in front of one of these signs for several weeks each night. The EMB Chair described the signs as ineffective in a letter to me. The signs worked for everyone except the one connected with tenant management who apparently had special dispensation to do as he pleased.
i. One such motor scooter started operating and parking on the Estate footpaths including parking on the footpath leading to Testerton Walk over three weeks ago. Despite my reporting this problem for over three weeks to all involved with authority for addressing this problem, it has remained parked there overnight and was present this morning. Does this motor scooter have special dispensation to operate and park on the Estate footpaths?
(1) Early this year signs were posted on the outside end of this building up high to avoid vandalism that this was private property with parking by permit only noting that violators would be subject to clamping and removal. This was a suggestion I had originally made in 1997 when it only applied to parking places on Verity Close and Grenfell Road.
(2) More recently the TMO Board Chair noted in her TMO Link magazine column that this parking restriction had been extended to the TMO properties.
(3) I have never seen anything else communicated generally to the tenants and residents about this policy change at the Lancaster West Estate. Although I immediately asked tenant management about this policy change when I initially saw the signs and called the company involved, I have not received any response concerning policy with regard to clamping/removing motor scooters/bikes parked on the Estate. My more recent second request has also so far gone unanswered.
(4) I did call the company to clamp this motor scooter a couple weeks ago. It is still there despite this and the correspondence as noted. On one day while returning to the Estate I was confronted with this motor scooter coming down the front footpath toward me passing a woman and her children as he did so while I filmed him. He stopped by me and asked why I was filming him in an intimidating manner.
(5) I have also filmed him driving onto the Estate under my kitchen window stopped talking to others who were with an auto that had booming music about 2300 recently.
(6) This motor scooter not only remains constituting a safety hazard day and night to those using the footpaths on the Estate, but it seeds other such antisocial and hazardous behaviour which I have also filmed and forwarded as I have done his activity.
f. Eight years ago tenant management created a state of disrepair by removing all 84 tiles on the floor of the balcony to this flat . That state of disrepair exists as of this date. See the attached copy of Email correspondence to tenant management about this problem yesterday which summarises this problem.
3. The ALMO status of the RBK&C TMO is nonexistent due to the fact the RBK&C has contracted with two separate organisations: the TMO and the Lancaster West EMB. The conflicts and problems which result from this Council maladministration and gross mismanagement by creating two separate tenant management organisations with respect to the Lancaster West Estate in North Kensington has resulted in the abuse of power which I have been experiencing for eight years and health as well as safety hazards which have persisted for a decade.
a. It is necessary to go back to the Council as a result of the conflicts and problems. The Council has ultimate responsibility for its two agents. In addition, there are interlocking boards of directors, and at least four elected local councillors serve on the 22 member TMO Board. These Councillors are responsible for managing the Council government. There presence on the TMO Board destroys its ALMO status.
b. The RBK&C TMO has also created the Lancaster West Tenants and Residents Association (TRA). This was described in my earlier correspondence three years ago. This organisation is nothing more than a duplicate of the EMB controlled by duplicate Board and Committee members with its Chair a former EMB Chair. An audit of the minutes of the EMB and TRA since the last inspection (and before) is important to reveal the interlocking directorates and nepotism which leads to a concentration of power control in the interest of those with top decision making positions.
i. These interlocking directorates and nepotism with its concentration of power have enabled decision making to be carried out in favour of those in power with a deliberate disregard for the overall needs of the tenants and residents. Tenant management has nothing to do with tenants or management. As a result, the problems described above persist as they have done for upwards of a decade threatening the safety and health of the tenants and residents while causing me direct personal injury by attempts to coverup my reporting of this abuse of power from the abuse of surveillance technology.
c. The complicated management structure with its three interlocking tenant management organisations makes it difficult if not impossible to address these problems by finding out precisely who is responsible and accountable. This confusing bureaucracy enables people to duck responsibility and the Council who is ultimately responsible does nothing trying to maintain the illusion of an ALMO. I call this illusionary management.
4. Worst of all in this is the fact that tenant management has evolved into a vigilante organisation directed against people like me who document and reported the truth to try to maintain fundamental standards to protect the safety and health of everyone. In my own situation I seek to preserve and protect my life which has been put directly and intentionally at risk while describing the overall situation which reflects the pattern of this continuous vigilante behaviour.
a. Please read the attachments carefully. I included them because what was reported three years ago exists today, and there is no sense in my repeating myself.
b. Please review the minutes of the EMB and TRA carefully for their AGMs. There are telling comments about the need to ask the tenants/residents about what they think. This is obviously being ignored and comes up by someone at the board level in one of these AGMs.
i. I have experienced that directly with the use of surveillance technology to attempt to destroy my activity and any possible participation in the tenant management process along with the TMO Company Secretary’s attempt to block my correspondence to the members of the TMO Board of Directors.
5. There are many more problems which are quite serious in this area.
a. Various aspects of antisocial behaviour including:
i. inline skate jumping over the fence at the narrow entrance to the Estate at the corner of Whitchurch & Bramley Roads under my kitchen window have been filmed and turned over to the police.
ii. Also, there has been small bicycle jumping on the fence outside my front window by the stairs near Whitchurch Road. This has been filmed as well and turned over to the police. This fence has been damaged. The fence under my kitchen window will soon be damaged.
iii. There is also skateboard jumping onto the benches out front which has been filmed as well and turned over to the police. The police are dealing with these matters.
6. There is a general disregard for the fact that this is a residential area with a large number of families with children of all ages that are impacted by the antisocial behaviour which comes from those who are in authority. This sets a standard for antisocial behaviour and worse which the young then emulate.
a. There was a serious problem with one of the business unit tenants last summer when this steel band organisation carried out practise five nights a week and on Sundays in the Catholic primary school across the street during the five weeks leading up to the Notting Hill Carnival.
i. I used a sound level meter, audio recordings and video tape filming to document all of this extensive antisocial behaviour carried out and supported by the those in authority with a complete disregard for the hundreds of residents in this tenant management environment.
ii. This went on day after day for weeks and completely obliterated normal life including this activity as follows:
(1) This steel band practise noise was excessive each evening Monday through Friday going on for hours until well after 2300 and sometimes after midnight contrary to promises originally made to get people’s cooperation in a letter sent out by this organisation.
(2) Groups formed afterwards and loitered in the street outside my kitchen window until as late a 1:00 am.
(3) It was impossible to get the RBK&C Noise and Nuisance Call Out service to deal with this problem.
(4) Alcohol was obviously being consumed by several in the group exiting late at night who appeared inebriated.
(5) Excess traffic double parked on the narrow Whitchurch Road blocked a Fire Brigade truck one night. Fortunately, this was a non-emergency blockage but serious nonetheless which caused the firemen to be obviously aggravated including the sounding of its extraordinarily loud horn after 2300.
(6) Children were involved who were up past midnight and participating in this antisocial behaviour.
(7) Children nearby my flat could not sleep which led to conflicts between parent and child.
b. There’s been a long standing problem with rubbish tipping and putting recyclables out by the Blue Bins by those who have been picking up the Orange Bags on a weekly basis.
i. That was cleaned up last Friday, and the area generally cleaned between the wall at the Testerton Walk and Whitchuch Road as a result of my correspondence.
ii. However, it appears as though the Catholic primary school across the street has been allowed by the Council and/or tenant management to place a rubbish skip right next to the end of this building.
(1) It attracts fly tipping from passersby which then contributes to the vermin infestation of this building which is fortified by the fact that rubbish sits on the floor by the front door all night.
(2) During the Easter two-week holiday, a skip was put at the end of the building while there was a buildup of large items in the area by the front door. These were large cabinets and what appeared to be the removal from a kitchen renovation. These stayed by the front door for a week.
(a) When they were finally removed they were carried out the front door and dumped on the footpath railing below to break them up at great noise one morning about 9:00 am.
(i) The entrance to this section of Hurstway Walk is by means of a ramp to the second floor door. The first floor door is accessed by a footpath parallel and below it with a railing along it. These large pieces of cabinet furniture were dropped on that railing to break them into pieces.
(ii) I happened to be leaving as this was finishing and filmed the last part of it when a very large cabinet over six feet tall was brought out and thrown from the above ramp onto the railing by the footpath below smashing it to pieces. This piece was so large it took two guys to throw it from above.
(iii) The big problem was that a man and a small child were coming from the yard on the other side through the gate under this ramp at the time they were bringing this huge cabinet out.
(iv) Fortunately, the man and the child went the other way. I filmed them coming through the fence incidentally to the fact that I was filming the activity above them. This video tape clip was made available to tenant management.
(v) This is precisely the kind of deliberate disregard for safety that appears across the board in many such activities.
iii. Despite having fully notified tenant management about the problems for the skip at the end of the building during the Easter two-week break, there was another rubbish skip by the end of the building once again last week during the then school holidays.
(1) Evidently, when the children are not there, the works at the school are increased to take advantage of this with an additional skip placed by this building since one is already inside the fence at the utility entrance to the school.
(2) Why don’t they put this skip by the kerb on Whitchurch Road next to the school’s utility gate?
(a) I think it’s because they can save money by not putting the skip on the road and completely disregard the fact that many people live in this residential building putting it right by the building treating those of us who live here as non-existent. We don’t matter to them.
iv. Five weeks of steel band practise five nights a week and on Sundays with complete disregard for all those who live here and putting rubbish skips right next to the building show a callous disregard and disrespect for other people.
7. It is no wonder that there is an antisocial problem here among the young because it is those in authority who think that they can ignore fundamental standards of safety and health who set the standard which is then followed by those growing up by operating and parking their motor vehicles on the Estate footpaths, carrying out inline skate, skateboard and bicycle jumping on the fences and benches and creating a disturbance at 5:30 am or 3:00 am as has recently happened.
a. If tenant management roasts everyone on their homes throughout the summer and fails to address the rubbish disposal problem so everyone lives in a rubbish dump, the reaction from the young will be antisocial behaviour especially when they see authority abusing its power to coverup whatever problems it wants instead of handling them properly and solving them. This is the education that the young are receiving in how to behave which translate into their own forms of antisocial behaviour and disrespect for others.
8. In the enclosed correspondence sent to James Edwards on 12th May 2003 I described the intense abuse to which I was subjected in its third paragraph.
a. The exact same thing continues especially in the run up to your forthcoming inspection in July 2006. The intensity of all kinds of surveillance driven abuse has been magnified during the past couple weeks in an effort to stop me from reporting the truth about this situation.
b. The antisocial behaviour from all sides of my flat 24/7 along with the surveillance technology abuse provides an obvious picture for a foundation of collusion since the surveillance technology is under the operational control of a relative of a nearby tenant.
c. There is a keen awareness of the forthcoming inspection, and every effort is being made to gloss over reality, hide the problems and destroy the efforts by people like me to document and report the facts in the interest of safety and health for everyone concerned as well as my own personal protection.
9. It beggars belief that apparently you were not aware of the fact that the central heating was permanently on at the Lancaster West Estate during the time of your inspection in the summer of 2003. This might have resulted in the deaths of people in early August 2003 since nationwide there were 2,000 deaths attributed to the heat alone without being augmented by central heating. Apparently, you missed this one entirely, and tenant management went on to deliberately disregard this extreme safety and health hazard until June 2005 when another heat wave caused me to contact BBC London.
a. How would you have looked if after awarding the RBK&C TMO two stars people died in June 2005 as a result of a heat wave with the central heating remaining on and unable to be turned off?
10. Tenant management in the RBK&C is “unfit for purpose” and “dysfunctional.”
a. Actually, it is worse. There is a:
i. deliberate disregard for people;
ii. a willful destruction of the property;
iii. a deliberate and ongoing coverup in many ways; and
iv. an escalation in antisocial behaviour while
v. the several bureaucratic tenant management organisations and
vi. the Council evade accountability and responsibility.
11. The abuse of power with the surveillance technology used against me 24/7 for almost eight years reflects the inherently destructive character of tenant management which is
a. fundamentally flawed,
b. unfit and
c. unable to manage anything.
12. I’ve concluded that tenant management is fundamentally a criminal organisation and getting worse as evidenced by the deliberate and continuous effort for almost eight years to destroy human activity and life along with escalating antisocial behaviour.
a. As I indicated three years ago in the attached Emails, funds for tenant management go to supporting criminal activity. This is hardly a proper use of taxpayer’s money which puts people’s lives in danger while the property is run down or deliberately subjected to damage.
13. There are important expense items for you to consider in your management audit which reflect the maladministration and gross mismanagement:
a. Costs:
i. Central heating fuel costs
ii. Water usage
(1) Years ago in 1998 I requested that Thames Water be allowed to install a water meter they were offering free. This was refused by tenant management for a reason that I considered nonsense.
(2) At that time the then Estate Officer told me that tenant management was making money from the water charging system and did not want to change.
iii. Coverup
(1) How much is it costing the tenant and/or Government to facilitate tenant management’s coverup activity, e.g., rubbish disposal.
iv. Service charges which just started last year
(1) It appears that the service charges are a source of abuse since expenditures are made for reasons that are not providing service, e.g., pest control, when the rubbish is placed on the floor all night and tipped outside next to the buildings attracting vermin of all kinds. I believe that these need to be carefully audited for they could reveal excessive expenditures reflecting inappropriate management.
Tenant management has missed the plot completely and failed to manage the fundamental needs for a large multiple dwelling environment. Instead, it has gone off in the direction of the personal agendas of those in the top decision making positions.
As a result all the efforts to rejuvenate, repair and create new housing in the face of a critical housing shortage in London have been perverted in this environment which can be directly attributable to a failure of tenant management.
Evidently under the pressure of the forthcoming inspection, steps are being taken to access my balcony from the outside to initiate inspection and possible repair after eight years as originally agreed after the state of disrepair was created by an agreed upon outside access to facilitate the repair. This was noted in an Email from tenant management this afternoon.
Yours sincerely
/s/Gary D Chance
enclosures (not provided with Email copy)
1. Friday, 2nd May 2003, correspondence to Audit Commission Housing Inspectorate
2. Monday, 12th May 2003, correspondence to James Edwards, Housing Research and Operations Officer, Audit Commission Housing Inspectorate
3. Monday, 9th June 2003, correspondence to the Prime Minister
4. Tuesday, 10th June 2003, correspondence to the Prime Minister
5. Monday, 5th June 2006, correspondence to and from Damian Donnelly, TMO/EMB Area Manager
6. Thursday, 1st June 2006, correspondence to Damian Donnelly, TMO/EMB Area Manager, and others