This is a blog created by registered property owners living in Meyersdal Nature Ext 1, 2, 3 / Meyersdal Eco Estate and not the official blog for the estate. It is not handled by the board at all and not censored unless bad language or sensitive photo's are used.
20 April 2010
Totally agree that the running of the estate is a farce
I totally agree with everything that is said in this article.
A while ago I was totally disgusted with one of the owners in the estate. They dug a big hole in the veldt near their house into which they dumped all their rubbish, broken tiles, cement rubble, papers etc. then covered this over taking away the good soil for their own stand!
I complained about this to management but nothing was done. Only months after wards I discover that I was not the only one complaining about this, but still to this day nothing was done by this owner or the management to rectify his un-eco friendly actions.
Now, I just wonder how many other problems there are similar to what has gone on at stand 324. I did not know about this problem with stand 324 , and I am sure others did not know about it until it was published on this blog.
Regards
Owl
14 April 2010
Farrar's summary of their problems with board and stand 324
This story will be very long if told in detail as it has been going on for more than a year. We have tried to summarize it as best we can.
Our first official complaint was sent to the board on the 8th of December 2008. We were not happy with goings on with the stand in front of us because of the amount of imported soil Mr Marques was dumping on his stand. We tried from March 2009 onwards to get an urgent, physically meeting at stand 324 with the Architectural committee. We had one phone call from Mr Malcolm Storey, chairman of the Architectural committee, promising that he will look into the matter. Despite several e-mails and calls we were ignored until the 6th May 2009 when we received a letter from the "board" stating they had employed a surveyor to check if the building is according to plan, and that they were satisfied that the building is complying with the guidelines. They also said that they have contacted the neighbours on both sides of stand 324 and that no one had any complaints. This letter indicated that it was the full "boards" decision - when in fact it was not.
At that time they had never contacted any neighbours, because we contacted these neighbours immediately after receiving this letter and both denied being contacted by any board member. This letter was not drafted with the knowledge of the "full board".
After e-mailing them that we knew, about the lie, about contacting the neighbours plus a lot more pressure from our side, we were granted a site meeting on the 8th June 2009. Some of the persons that were present were - Trevor Coleman (chairman), Deon Oosthuizen, Malcolm Storey, Rynette Farrar, Will Oosthuizen and Mrs Marques with her contractor. Adrian Farrar was not there as he was out the country at that time. I, Rynette recorded the whole conversation on tape. You can clearly hear on this recording that Mr Coleman hardly gave me any time to speak and try and steamroller over me all the time. Also on this recording you can hear the board members present beginning to argue about where the bench mark for height purposes is after I popped this question to them. The board/management were arguing about this and were made quiet by Trevor Coleman with the words "we better canvas". We found out later from Will Oosthuizen that they tried to move this bench mark, after discovering that we were indeed correct. At this meeting it was agreed however that we can employ our own surveyor and that they will re-think their actions if our surveyor find anything.
Mr Visser was then employed by us as our surveyor and wanted the details of the original surveyor who took the contour details at the beginning before any landfill was done. Mr Marques told the committee that it was a Mr Richardson but he is no longer in the country. Mr Visser however knew Mr Richardson and contacted him (Mr Richardson knew nothing about leaving the country) and Mr Visser's report was based on these original contours. Mr Visser also contacted Mr Margot (the surveyor that the estate engaged) only to learn that the committee never told him to check and see if when this house is in fact completed if it will fall within the maximum 10m height. He was never even given a building plan. He was just told to give the contour heights of the first and second tree, as well as the foundation slab and the bench mark. This house was also built higher than the original approved plans.
Mr Visser found that this house was moved substantially away from the road and was lifted more by 1,63m. The zero line was approve at 6.0m but was now at 7.63m. Mr Visser also discovered that the entrance between the two garages are made bigger and the building line exceeded. Mr Visser's report stated that the top of the wall (with no roof) on southern side was at 12.0m This report was given to the committee, but still they refuse to do anything. They came out with silly remarks like, that if Mr Marques put a flat roof on this section that he will be in the 10m height limit, totally ignoring the fact the report said the wall is already at 12m (wall two meters to high - never mind any sort of roof). The other silly remark was that Mr Marques, and his contractor Victor, said that they will drop the slabs to be within the 10m height limit. As far as we know the slabs are not moveable! The fact that they come out with such absurd suggestions and that the committee actually believes him, gave us the idea that from the start this committee was not intresting in solving this problem at all and they are still not until up to this very day.
We finally went to the council to get a stop order issued as they were building off plan. "Somebody" must have told them to built as quick as possible and then we cannot stop them. Mr Marques and Victor went on building illegally for two or three days. They had told Deon Oosthuizen that the council has given them permission to carry on and that he has a letter stating so. I phoned the council and found out that this was untrue. After putting pressure on Deon Oosthuizen he then finally stop them from carrying on.
Mr Marques tried to hand in his new as build plan on the 27th October 2009 but Deon Oosthuizen gave it back to him as the contour lines were not correct. Now "somebody", (other than Deon), decided that this incorrect /inaccurate plan will be approved and they will also relax the building line without our permission (they got the other two neighbours to sign). This "somebody" also gave the council a letter stating that none of the neigbours had any complaints knowing fully well that we are complaining. The definition in the council documents state that a neighbours is any adjacent stand even if a road seperates them. Now if this action does not show any wrong doing, then we don't know what does.
We have subsequently reported this Architect to the SA council board of Architects and they are currently busy with their investigations
Out of frustration, we decided to distribute petition letters to home owners telling them about this case and this is where we discovered that most of the board members were not aware of this problem at all. We were contacted by some of them asking for more details.
We promply then requested a meeting with the "whole board" and this took place on the 3rd of December 2009. The board told us that they cannot ask anybody to pull their house down, but they can pull back their permission to build, in which case the owner will have no choice other than to rectify the problem even if it means pulling down some parts of his house. They said that they would have a meeting first with this owner in the new year. We requested at this meeting that if they want another surveyor report then Mr Richardson should be allowed to do this. We also requested that the Architectural committee members that were involved in this problem from the beginning, not be allowed to conduct any meetings and make any decisions without the full board - this was agreed to.
From four different sources we knew that some of the board members at this meeting said that we had actually given them enough proof that Mr Marques was grossly in the wrong here, and that they don't need another surveyor report.
Then certain board members decided that it were not in their interest to have other board members attending these meetings and they hastilly arrange a meeting with Mr Marques on the 21th January 2010 and then another one on the 26th January 2010, where they then promply made a decision regarding this case. They gave extremely short notice to all board members and thus most could not attend due to other commitments.
All our arguements were quashed with a statement that no further contact would be entertained and that we should not get any lawyers involved as this would create animosity. They forget that with doing this they now created animosity thoughout the estate.
This whole mess and susequent capitulation of these few board members could have been prevented had they any principles about the fact that estate guidelines are compulsary for all.
This also makes us wonder, why does the rest of the board allow these individuals to make and run the board on scorned eggo's instead of facts put on the table.
Everybody must also remember that Mr Marques had serveral lawyers letters warning him that he is going forward totally at his own risk. So no one should feel sorry for him.
Adrian and Rynette

Official website of the estate a farce
For a month or so, a group of us have had discussions via e-mail about the official website of the estate. Most of the views we received back were that this is not a website dedicated to the home owners, but rather for "some" board members to show that they can flex even more muscle. The fact that they are still on to some owners for not complying with the guidelines and others (even if the board have proof in front of them) get away with anything.
We decided to put Rynette Farrar up to posting comments on their forum under the heading "Stand 186 Open Ducts", and not amazingly of course, they blocked it immediately. Attached here are the two comments she posted on their forum page and also the e-mail she received back from them the next morning.
First comment sent:-
Re: Stand 186 Open Ducts 1 Day, 8 Hours ago Karma: 0
Don't be so sure that the board will do something about it, because the Guidelines book is only for a selective number of people. Some will get away with it and others are told to comply.

Rynette
Fresh Boarder Posts: 2
Second comment sent:-
Re: Stand 186 Open Ducts 1 Day, 6 Hours ago Karma: 0
Having read some of these letters again, I cannot believe that the board is till pressing on about residents not complying with the Guidelines. I have been complaining about stand 324's height (which is now at 12.0m plus his roof) since December 2008 before even one brick was laid. After giving the board the proof of this with my land surveyor's report (even the estate's land surveyor agrees) and been promised by the board in December 2009 that they will withdraw their permission for this building to carry on, they decided not to do this because of previous poor decisions made by their own Architectural Committee board. In their last meeting about this problem, most of them agreed that I had given them enough proof that this building was not according to the Guidelines. Giving the owner a fine is not going to bring back my view or my privacy either. Are decisions made by the board according to the proof in front of them or by consensus or by some who wish to dominate proceedings? Many of the answers to my correspondence were in fact from decisions of only two or three members but signed as if it were from the entire board. I have from the beginning addressed my concerns to the entire board and not to the Architectural Committee only. I only discovered late into this saga that many of the board members were not privy to what was going on until my petition. Why have they all been kept in the dark? If the truth been known about this case, the decisions made by the Architectural Committee on behalf of the "full board" were wrong. To cover their 'butts' they obviously had to support these few decision makers regardless of their poor performance. It appears to me that 'the rules and guidelines' are about as worthless as some of the board members who were elected to police them. Unfortunately the actions of some of the
board members have brought down the integrity of the board as an entity in my opinion. My advice to everyone is to send board members to go and rectify the wrong doings on stand 324 first, before they come and force other people to comply with 'minor' issues. Maybe it is also a good idea to make a nice fire with the guideline book this winter.
Rynette
Fresh Boarder Posts: 2
This was the e-mail that was send to Rynette the next morning -
From: Meyersdal Nature Estate Forum (mailto:info@natureestate.co.za)
Sent: 06 April 2010 01:45PM
To: rynette@orbitaldistributors.co.za
Subject: (Meyersdal Nature Estate Forum)
Re: Stand 186 Open Ducts (Eco Compliments And Complaints)
A new post has been made to a topic which you have subscribed on the Meyersdal Nature Estate Forum
Posted by: Die Magistraat
Message:-
Bla Bla Bla! Rules are there for everyone! But the forum rules don't get followed by the very person that blatantly hijacks someone elses post - total disregard and disrespect. And then goes to brake another rule where insult follows the matter!
Ek is nie snaaks nie maar jy het vandag jou naam so hard geplank - ek kan 'n boek skryf.
Welgedaan!
-----Don not answer this e-mail notification as it is a generated e-mail.**Powered by ITH-http://www.ithorizons.co.za**
But we did send them the following answer -
Ja, Bla, Bla, Bla - jy's gevang vir 'n sucker!!!! Het dit gepos en presies wat ons gedink het, het gebeur!! Ons is 'n klomp wat nou gesien het wat julle doen - julle het die toets met los hande gedop. Jammer!
Pos iets waarvan die "brotherwood" nie hou nie, en dit word nie gepubliseer nie!
En julle noem julle self deursigtig - kry 'n life!
Rynette
We actually expected to catch a fish, but that the fish would be so quick and so big - this was awesome! Die magistraat - board member that set a good example?
Until later
Ciarra
Start our own home owners group
We are a group of home owners that are looking for more owners to join us. We feel that there are many issues that are never resolved by the board / management and in fact a lot of letters of complaint have gone unanswered.
If we start our own group, getting suggestions from people, listing problems as well as unsolved problems and communicate it back to the board members, maybe we will stand a better change in getting things done and sorted out. This we also feel will make the yearly AGM more of a pleasure (instead of a circus).
Please e-mail me if you would like to join the home owners group.
Regards
Ciarra
13 April 2010
Architectural board members of last year
Malcolm Storey was the chairman and the other members of the team were Etienne Stols, Nico Kruger and John O’Connor.
Hope this answers all your questions.
Ciarra
Now can you believe this?
The other day I went through my “estate” file and I came across the minutes of the AGM of 30 October 2008.
Mrs Erasmus of stand 208 asked the following question – How do we rectify the houses that did not comply with the building lines or heights?
Trevor Coleman as chairman answered – It is the task of the building inspector to ensure that houses comply with the building guidelines and rules. Work is stopped on houses not complying until they comply.
Did Mr Coleman had a memory failure or has he got a personal vendetta against the Farrar’s? Just wondering.
Chow
Gato
Uil kaste
My twee kinders is so opgewonde, want pa is aangesê om vir elkeen ‘n uile kas te maak. Miskien moet meer pa’s my voorbeeld volg, sodat ons ‘n goeie uile gemeenskap kan opbou.
Totsiens van Snorrebaard
Ons is sowaar geseënd
Hello daar almal
Partykeer as die ouderdoms pyne my beet kry en ek nie kan slaap nie, is die beste medisyne ‘n koppie boeretroos op my stoep.
Ek het al talle ure in die donker hier gesit en luister na al die nag geluide. Dis verbasend hoeveel verskillende geluide ‘n mens kan hoor. Daar is kriek en padda kore, voëls en ook Meneer Uil wat die mooiste geluide maak. As ek gelukkig is soms en die bokke is naby, kan ek hulle geluide ook hoor. Julle moet dit bietjie op die proef stel.
Dis wanneer ek hier sit met al die natuur geluide om my en ek sien die son opkom voor my, dat ek werklik besef hoe geseënd ons is wat hier bly.
Net een stukkie advies – as jy wil buite sit, trek vir jou pantser klere aan. Ek weet nie of dit orals is nie, maar hier langs die dam eet die muskiete ons voos!
Tot later
Blou Bulle