Window Safety Days and a Dog Campaign

June 6 and Dec 12 this year are designated to be Window Safety Days (yes, day with an 's') for Singapore. It seems like this is going to be a great campaign to educate the public the importance of maintaining their windows to prevent them from falling off high-rise apartment buildings in our densely populated country.

This campaign was announced in a statement jointly issued by HDB and the Building and Construction Authority (BCA) as a result of increased incidents of windows frames falling off building along with the glass panes. Year 2009 recorded 71 cases, up from 44 in 2008. (see Joint Statement here)

The main thrust of the message apparently is to warn home owners and tenants of the consequences if they failed to adhere to the law (Building Maintenance and Strata Management Act). Here goes :

For falling windows due to poor maintenance, owners are liable to be fined S$10,000 and/or face up to 12 months in jail.

In addition, if the fallen casement windows are found to have aluminum rivets instead of stainless steel rivets required by law, they can also face a penalty of six months in jail and/or S$5,000 fine.

Singapore is well known for many campaigns. Long ago, we used to have Use You Hands Campaign, Singapore OK Campaign, Speak Mandarin Campaign and a list of many others, too long to accommodate here.

Perhaps HDB should consider doing a 'No Dog-Barking Campaign' to eradicate the incessant disturbance by these man's best friends in the middle of the silent night. This can be followed by a 'No Dog-poo in HDB Void Deck' Campaign to mitigate the huge problem of dog's excrement and urine along HDB flats corridors, walkways, grass patches etc etc.

This can be done jointly with the National Environment Agency (NEA) since these excrements pose a health threat, especially when these waste products land right in front of PAP Community Foundation (PCF) kindergartens. We want to prevent Hand Foot Mouth Disease and child related ailments, aren't we not?

HDB should also be exercise fairness to cats. Why allow homeowners to rear dogs in HDB flats when cats are banned outright from being kept as pets? Some strange animal ruling HDB has. Meow...