We believe that our vision for sustainability is to the benefit of all our stakeholders. We know that clear and ongoing communication play an essential role in our activities, ensuring that our stakeholders are fully informed of what we do, while also giving them an understanding of, and ability to respond to, our initiatives to help ensure their success.
We have identified our stakeholders as those who are an integral part of our operations and form an essential role in meeting our vision for sustainable housing. They are:
- Residents in our estates;
- Business partners, including contractors and sub-contractors;
- Our staff;
- Other government colleagues;
- District Councils;
- Green Groups;
- Educational and Professional Institutions; and,
- The media.
Examples of our various mechanisms and programmes to maintain stakeholder dialogue in our processes for development plans and new proposals include:
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The Estates Management Advisory Committee (EMAC), which has just celebrated its 10 th year as a venue for local level participation in estate management. The EMAC continues to make suggestions on day-to-day management issues and minor improvement works, assist formulating estate action plans and assessing contractors' performance .
- Regular tenant surveys for the Property Management Agency;
- A three-month public consultation was launched in March 2006 on the review of our domestic rent policy (see Your voice counts: Rent Policy Public Consultation );
- Our new long-term community environmental programme ' Green Delight in Estates' in collaboration with a number of local green groups was rolled out in 2005 at 30 estates, with extension scheduled to cover all Public Rental Housing (PRH) estates over the next few years;
- 'Estate Green Fun Day' was held in 17 estates during last year to encourage tenants to carry out green practices at home for good health and hygiene within our estates;
- In 2005/06, 13 project partnering workshops with our consultants and contractors were organized at the early stage of building contracts to share experiences, to establish common project goals and communication channels. After residents' in-take, five post-completion reviews were held with the participation of HA project team members, resident representatives , contractors, consultants, estate management agencies with the main objective to understand how well our estates meet user needs and expectation; and
- Consultation and the resultant provision of barrier-free access to our new developments and existing estates. Our design planning goes far beyond the existing requirements for facilitating mobility of the disabled and the elderly.
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In March 2006, we launched a three-month consultation programme to invite public views on the review of our domestic rent policy. We aim to develop a policy that is flexible and rational, has a closer link to tenants' affordability and helps promote the long-term sustainability of the public housing programme. The responsible ad-hoc committee has carefully considered public responses and drawn up the Report on the Review of Domestic Rent Policy setting out its final recommendations. One of the most important reform proposals put forward is the development of an income-based rent adjustment mechanism which provides for both upward and downward adjustment in PRH rent according to the changes in tenants' household income. The Report was considered and endorsed by the Housing Authority in November 2006. The Government introduced an legislative amendment bill with provisions governing the recommended rent adjustment mechanism in January 2007. |
We continue to utilize the 'Housing Channel' to communicate housing-related messages to PRH tenants. Liquid Crystal Display (LCD) monitors have been installed in the ground floor lift lobbies of residential blocks for the Channel to effectively reach its target audience.
In 2005/06 we produced over 50 videos on an array of housing-related topics, such as developments in the Review of Domestic Rent Policy, the Total Maintenance Scheme, the Rent Assistance Scheme, as well as green practices. These videos were uploaded onto our website so that they are easily accessible to tenants and the public. We also continued to provide suggestion boxes at places convenient to our tenants and to use suitable posters to serve as a way of providing information to our tenants.
In addition, the EMAC newsletters are distributed directly to each household semi-annually to update residents on important housing issues and estate news.
| In general, we make it a point to conduct stakeholder consultations as early as the planning stage of our developments. We believe that presenting to them our plans and listening to their concerns is one of the keys to our success. |
We have various channels to promote and facilitate communication with our staff. There are five Departmental Consultative Committees and the Occupational Safety and Health Sub-committee to provide a forum of discussion between the management and the staff side on matters of mutual concerns. We maintain close liaison with staff through goodwill visits, workshops, briefings and tea receptions. Staff can conveniently give suggestions through the staff suggestion boxes placed at office premises and also through the HA Intranet. We have in place the Staff Suggestions Scheme to give recognition and incentives to staff for their suggestions. In addition, our online newsletter, Housing Dimensions , is published bi-weekly to keep our colleagues posted of both corporate and staff news.
Our Staff Club regularly organizes events and activities for the Housing Authority staff. For instance, outings, sports classes and competitions, interest groups were held in the year to help enhance the work-life balance of our staff.
We conduct regular surveys to gauge our tenants' views on estate management. We conduct various customer satisfaction surveys and other ad-hoc surveys to tenants on issues such as the existing domestic block design. We also undertake regular Housing Return Surveys. Alternatively, tenants may bring forward their views to EMAC or local District Councils from which the views and suggestions are dealt with efficiently.
Operated and managed by the Housing Department Integrated Communication Centre (HDICC), the HD Enquiry Hotline serves as a main channel to address complaints and enquiries from tenants and the public. During this financial year, the HDICC has received over 790,000 calls, or a daily average of 2,200 calls. We also introduced the Complaints and Requests Management System (CRMS) in late 2005 to ensure complaints are efficiently handled.
Engagement of Local Green Groups and Tenantsfor a Long Term Sustainable Community Programme With the aim of launching a sustainable programme with local green groups and community participation to continuously foster tenants' awareness on environmental protection and waste recovery, we rolled out the 'Green Delight in Estates' in 2005 at 30 estates. The programme was organized in conjunction with the Conservancy Association, Friends of the Earth (HK) and Green Power and some 300 young PRH tenants were recruited as Green Estate Ambassadors. The Green Estate Ambassadors were properly trained on environmental protection concepts and were sent off to trumpet green messages.
We have adopted a train-the-trainer educational approach with our Green Estate Ambassadors. Each of the three green groups in the programme would design and implement environmental initiatives for ten estates and the programme would roll out in batches to all other PRH estates in the next few years.
Right after the Green Delight in Estates launching ceremony, the guests joined the Green Estate Ambassadors and members of the Housing Department Volunteer Corps to help single elderly tenants in Lok Fu Estate clean up their homes. This was believed to be a good start for sustainable engagement with our tenants and local green groups and ultimately to make our estates an environmentally friendlier place to live in.
As a result of this awareness-raising programme, we believe that there have already been benefits and we have noticed that there has been a behavioural change amongst our residents. For example, PRH tenants this year generated about 5% less domestic refuse than the previous year and maintained a continuous drop for the third consecutive year. Recent surveys in different estates undertaken by the Housing Authority showed that more than 70% of the participated tenants in the programme ranked themselves more aware of environmental issues.
We understand that environmental protection and environmental conservation are long-term commitments and would require a continued effort with engaging green groups and tenants. Green Delight in Estates demonstrated a good example of collaborated community-engagement effort among green groups, tenants, EMACs and non-governmental organisations.
