SPLUMA implementation course comes to Gauteng

After a very successful a 2-day Spatial Planning and Land Use Management Act (SPLUMA) implementation course in Cape Town earlier this year, Community Law Centre’s Prof Jaap de Visser and African Centre for Cities’ Stephen Berrisford, are very happy to be presenting the course in Gauteng on 30 and 31 July 2015, at the Sunnyside Park Hotel.

This course is designed to equip practitioners in the planning and legal professions, in private and government practice, to meet the challenges of implementing the SPLUMA, 2013. This Act came into effect on 1 July 2015. The Act introduces far-reaching changes to the legal and institutional framework for urban and regional planning in South Africa.

The course will locate the advent of SPLUMA within the context of planning law reform in South Africa, since 1910, and will provide both theoretical and practical guidance on the key features of the planning system that will change as a result of SPLUMA. A key feature of the new system introduced by SPLUMA is a re-alignment of the decision-making mandates of local and provincial government. It is also a framework Act, so it will have to operate in tandem with provincial planning laws and/or municipal planning by-laws. SPLUMA also introduces a new role for national government in both spatial planning and land use decision-making. These represent fundamental changes in the way that the planning system works. The course intends to dispel some of the confusion that exists behind the reasons for SPLUMA containing the provisions that it does, and to support participants as they seek to carry out their current functions in the context of the new legislation.

Participants in the Cape Town course found it very useful - the course evaluations glowed! While many of them had travelled from Gauteng and other provinces for the course they encouraged us to hold the course in Gauteng as well, which are excited to do now. The course focuses on the practical implications of implementing SPLUMA, as well as building an understanding of how and why SPLUMA contains the provisions that it does. We ensure that the implementation of SPLUMA is understood within the context of South Africa’s evolving planning law, which in turn is part of our evolving Constitutional and Administrative law.

The course was designed to to be useful for planners, engineers and lawyers - as well as any other professionals working in the built environment, in both the public and private sectors. Since the Cape Town course we have updated the material to reflect the new SPLUMA regulations as well as the greater certainty around the date on which the Act comes into effect - which I’m sure you don’t need reminding is just around the corner.

If you are interested in attending please register with the Continuing Professional Development Office at UCT, ebe-cpd@uct.ac.za.

There is a downoadable application form on the website at www.cpd.uct.ac.za/applications/. All the details are on the attached brochure. Please circulate this email to colleagues who you think might be interested in attending.