ANALYSIS OF TOWN COUNCIL MAINTENANCE FUND

Abstract

By 1991, town councils took over from the Housing and Development Board the management of all public housing estates in Singapore. They will ensure that corridors are swept, rubbish cleared and lifts repaired, besides managing common areas such as carparks, gardens and publishing newsletters First suggested in 1984, town councils represent the Government effort to put more power into the people's hands and to make them responsible for the area they live in The Government had concluded that HDB had grown too large for the board to be able to respond to the differing needs and preferences of people living in different estates. The Town Council Act was passed in May 1988 and the first three Ang Mo Kio town councils were gazetted in October. Since then, town councils have moved fast to create their own identities with logos and newsletters. Other new areas undertaken by the town councils includes the landscaping of parks and gardens. After about 7 years of establishment and operation, it is time for further evaluation. This dissertation serves to evaluate town council performance based on its physical maintenance aspect of town councils. Analysis of physical maintenance fund is divided into four sections. The first section deals with the changes in routine maintenance expenditure and sinking fund from 1991-1994. It was observed that there was a general increase in the maintenance expenditure Next, analysis of variance is carried out for the actual and estimated maintenance funds. The results obtained for sinking fund expenditure were of higher values. Thirdly, the determination of maximum arrears level permissible in the service and conservancy charges collection of Phase II Town Councils in order to breakeven in its routine management aspect. It was reported that the amount of arrears town councils could afford to have was about 5-7%. Finally, the correlation analysis of the maintenance expenditure indicated that the independant variables (number of units more than three rooms, the number of units more than 12 years and surplus fund) had an impact on the expenditure.