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1. New police HQ lives up to high price

2. Mothballed HOS estate to be kept for sale in 2006

1. New police HQ lives up to high price
BENJAMIN WONG , SCMP 29 October 2004

"I think most of you will say, `Wow', when you see the view," said a police spokesman sounding every bit the property salesman.

And that was the reaction of most reporters to the view from the press room on the 10th floor of the new police headquarters, overlooking Victoria Harbour and the Academy for Performing Arts.

It gave a hint of what the view must be like from the commissioner's office, which crowns the 42-floor building on Arsenal Street in Wan Chai.

The glimpse came as the press was shown around the $2 billion facility, although the tour was confined to places the public would likely visit. Off the itinerary were more sensitive operational sites like the huge firing range.

But the force did show off its dining room, where glass walls allow unobstructed views across Admiralty and the Tamar site.

Also on display were the multipurpose hall and the auditorium - which can be linked via the internet for video conferences.

Various police branches, including those housed previously in rented premises across the city, started moving into the complex in August.

It is estimated that about 8,000 people will be working in the building when it is fully opened early next year.

Moving units away from leased commercial premises will save the police $38.4 million a year, according to calculations by the Security Bureau in 2000.

Commissioner Dick Lee Ming-kwai was among the first top brass to move in, settling into his office on August 21, a date apparently chosen in accordance with fung shui principles.

2. Mothballed HOS estate to be kept for sale in 2006
FELIX LO , SCMP 29 October 2004

Housing Authority members yesterday backed a government proposal to keep mothballing flats in a controversial subsidised development pending their sale in 2006 - brushing aside calls for them to be let or sold to homebuyers now.

Kingsford Terrace in Ngau Chi Wan was built by New World Development for sale under the Home Ownership Scheme (HOS), then bought back for $1.4 billion by the government after HOS flat sales were frozen until 2006 as part of measures to push up property prices.

It is estimated the 2,010 flats will sell for about $2 billion, netting the government $1 billion after legal and management fees but not fully recouping the repurchase price, a source said.

The plan was one of five options put to authority members yesterday. The others were: using the flats as public rental housing or as government staff quarters, selling them on the open market or renting them at nearer market rates to well-off public housing tenants.

"That's good. The flats are kept for sale as HOS flats as intended, so there will be no public outcry about whether the flats are sold to cheaply or too dearly to private developers," said Wong Leung-sing, a senior manager of the research department of Centaline Property Agency.

There was an outcry after the government sold another privately built frozen HOS development, the harbourfront Hunghom Peninsula, back to its developers at what was seen as a knock-down price. The developers plan to demolish the seven-block estate and put up luxury homes on the site.

Authority member and social activist Ho Hei-wah said the government should consider the option of converting the flats into public housing for rent, since close to 100,000 residents were still living in bed-space apartments.

Ip Chiu-ping, chief secretary of the Hong Kong People's Council on Housing Policy, said the government should sell the flats to well-off tenants of public housing now.

"It's absurd that we are faced with the situation where some people do not have their own places to live in and available flats are being left vacant. If such flats are to be sold after 2006 as HOS flats, why can't that be done now?" she said.

Wong Kwun, the chairman of the Federation of Hong Kong, Kowloon and New Territories Public Housing Estates Resident and Shopowner Organisations, who also attended the meeting, agreed.

"I don't support the suspension of the sales. The government won't even say the flats will definitely be sold by 2007," he said.

The two developments were left vacant after the government froze HOS sales in 2002.