The Cape’s water crisis has gripped the province with golf clubs no less affected with Westlake taking appropriate action to play their part in delaying Day Zero.
READ: How Pearl Valley is coping with the drought
The popular Cape Town golf club has released a statement via social media where they explain their water usage, the decision to turn off the showers and other steps in their bid to play their part as responsible citizens.
Westlake’s view in full:
‘Hello Everyone, You are all very much aware of the crisis facing the Western Cape in the coming months due to the water shortage.
This affects everyone and in order to avoid Day Zero, every single one of us must do everything we can to save every drop of water. This is our civic duty and the morally correct thing to do.
The club is currently using 330 000 litres of water a month in the clubhouse. This is a huge saving over the same period last year where we were using virtually 3 times that amount. However, that is still a MASSIVE amount of water.
While many of you are very frugal with how much water you use when showering, there is still a great deal of wastage occurring. As our toilets are not of the cistern type, but use the pressure push-button system, we are not able to use grey shower water to flush toilets as Virgin Active and similar institutions are doing. (We are currently purchasing waterless urinals and fitting flow restrictors to all taps). Having taken all this into account and deliberated long and hard on the subject, the Main Committee took the difficult decision to turn off the showers from next week Friday.
All the municipal courses in the area have been forced to so in recent weeks and we feel that doing the same is the right thing to do. Our neighbours at Clovelly are currently considering turning off too.
We have been inundated with requests from members to take this step and frankly, we have no choice. We are in the extremely fortunate position of having sufficient effluent water to not only keep our golf course open and playable, but arguably be the best in the region! This does have negative connotations however.
Such a visually beautiful golf course, seen spraying its playing areas daily is creating a great deal of negative publicity, despite this being water that can only be used for this purpose and which would end up in False Bay if we didn’t make use of it. By turning off showers voluntarily and ensuring that message is communicated to the public at large through social media, we believe any negativity surrounding our irrigation practices will be nullified. From now on our Captain, Martin Hill will not be doing prizegiving freshly showered in his slacks and jacket.
Instead, he will do this in his golf clothes and shoes, ensuring the correct message is portrayed. We are well aware of the risk this poses to our business in the middle of season with hundreds if not thousands of overseas visitors making use of our facilities, but the universal message we have received from all those we have spoken to, is one of unequivocal support. Please assist us in ensuring that the message that not using our showers is the right thing to do gets out there and most importantly, as our loyal, fair-minded members, a huge word of thanks for your support and understanding. We can get through this and because of your support and all of us standing together, we will!
Finally, the club is acting pro-actively and is currently connecting one of our boreholes to the main building water supply so that should it be needed, we will have an independent supply of water. More information on this development will be in the newsletter in coming weeks.
Sincerely, Committee and Management’
Photo: Fahiema Enous/Instagram
