Page 59 - KBHA Bulletin 16

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Of interest is a list of some of the people who signed the petition supporting

Schechter’s plant – 90 years on many of these names are still well known in Kalk
Bay: Fernandez, de la Cruz, Padua, Clarence, Sasman, Cloete, Erispe, Edwards,

Poggenpoel, Fish, Rosslind, and Pepino.

The issue of Schechter’s fish plant divided the community. The fishermen thought it
would mean an improved market for their fish. The new investors in the area were

worried that their property values would decline. Property owners from Windsor Road

to Muizenberg signed petitions in opposition, wrote to the papers, and demanded
meetings with the Council. Owners and managers of the King’s and other hotels

pointed out how much money they had invested, and how much they paid in rates.

They were relying on tourists – the manager of Leslie’s Hotel said he had already had
a telegram from a Johannesburg family cancelling their booking for the season. A

meeting was held in the Olympia Picture Palace under the auspices of the Kalk Bay
Muizenberg Ratepayers. Many heavyweights in local politics and business were there.

Murray Bisset MLA, Capt. Gentry, Gourlay, Orpen, Steytler, Zoutendyck, Matabele
Thompson and many more. According to a press report ‘pandemonium sometimes

reigned’ at the meeting as the fishermen at the back made their feelings heard.

Although there had been 191 petitioners against the plant – together with many
individual petitions from the big businesses of the area – their wishes had been

ignored. At the root of much of the heat generated was the view that municipal
unification, in force since 1913, was not serving property owners’ interests. Local

decision making and protection of vested interests had been suppressed.

A meeting was called in Rondebosch, attended by ratepayers’ committees from

Woodstock to Kalk Bay. The Schechter plant and the Council’s decision to ride
rough-shod over the wishes of local property owners were the catalyst for this

meeting. It resulted in several resolutions being passed recording the dissatisfaction

over the way Cape Town handled the unified municipalities.

Who could have imagined that a proposal for a small fish-curing plant in Windsor
Road would end up involving the central government, the City of Cape Town,

Ratepayers Associations from Woodstock to Kalk Bay and local businesses, residents
and fishermen? Not to mention the press who lived on this story for many a day.