A recent Community Board issue again highlighted the need for cultural change with in our TCDC.
Briefly an elected Community Board Chair submitted his report following a Community Board meeting. It was then required to go through a Governance Review by Council staff.
It came back with redactions, changes and rewritten points in red ink.
The message was clear. An elected Community Board Chair is not permitted to write his report, nor indeed even reference Community matters or operational matters or ask for information without interference from the Council staff.
Noting that Governance is a matter for elected members, these actions smacked at best of censorship and control and at worst were clear breaches by paid Council staff of the Local Government Act and the Local Government Information and Meetings Act 1987.
It was only the intervention of the Mayor that the perfectly reasonable and professional report was finally accepted in its original form.
To prevent further “mistakes” such as this, I suggest the following:
TCDC need a clear vision statement “To serve our residents and ratepayers with a high degree of excellence” (my suggestion).
Then we can break it down:
- To really consult, listen to, and then action the requirements of our constituency in a professional way.
- To have clear performance requirements and measures in place.
- To foster a “can do” culture from the top down.
A simple but effective change would be to create a one-stop shop for building consents. One council staff member would be the sole point of contact and be responsible for the efficient and effective processing of the application.
Sadly, our District has one of the worst economic performances in the country with just 0.4% growth in 2025. Our employment and unemployment rates are also poor.
Suggestions: Given that tourism is our major earner, let’s take a leaf out of our cousins at the Queenstown Lakes District Council. They have put in place visitor attractions such as multiple cycle and walkways. Why not a Great Walk along the Coromandel Ranges from the Kopu-Hikuai to the northern tip of the Peninsula?
This would require extensive work and cooperation with DoC, local Iwi and local business interests but our Southern Cousins have shown that it can be done. This would be an economic boon to the Peninsula with much improved employment rates and bring in millions of dollars annually and it’s a clean green activity too.
