We have been working hard with our tenants, leaseholders and partners to improve our housing services and achieve our vision of making South Tyneside the place people are proud to call home.
It's been a record year for South Tyneside Homes, with more than 4000 homes being brought up to the Government's Decent Homes Standard. Tenants have benefited from brand new kitchens, bathrooms and other improvement works incluing rewiring.
We have completed single to double glazing upgrades in more than 3000 homes, helping tenants save money on their fuel bills and increasing comfort levels in their homes.
We have installed almost 6000 external doors helping our tenants to stay safe.
727 homes have benefited from new roofs and a further 512 homes have been fully repointed.
We have finished Decent Homes work at one Sheltered Housing Scheme and started work at another.
This year we have installed more than 4400 new energy efficient heating systems. Not only does this mean warmer, cheaper to heat homes for our tenants but they also create a saving of more than 5700 tonnes in Carbon Dioxide emissions.
We recently won a Regional Award from fuel poverty charity National Energy Action (NEA) for our work on a groundbreaking renewable energy project in Lukes Lane. The project sees renewable energy heating systems being installed in 52 homes.
The new systems are replacing aging air ducted systems which are inefficient, costly and can have negative health affects. The homes will benefit from air source heat pumps and solar thermal panels, providing affordable warmth and hot water in a healthier, low carbon environment.
We have established a further six Green Gardening Groups in partnership with Groundwork South Tyneside and Newcastle. The Groups get tenants working out in the open air doing practical work for their immediate local environment that helps to keep them healthy, fit and active. The partnership has seen tenants creating colourful tubs and hanging baskets, rockeries, sensory gardens and even growing their own herbs and vegetables.
We have relaunched our free Handy Homes service to give all new and existing tenants a little bit of extra help with a range of small
jobs in the home.
To help keep staff vehicles off the road and cut carbon emissions further we haven established an electric pool car scheme. This is an important step in the development of environmentally friendly travel in South Tyneside.
All of these achievements are fantastic news for our tenants, for the local economy and for the regeneration of the borough as a whole. We will be working even harder in 2010-11 to continue making South Tyneside the place people are proud to call home.
for more infomration visit the South Tyneside Homes website