Chair announced, groups to be formed

From the Office of the Mayor Len Brown

Port working group chair announced

Auckland Council today announced the appointment of Rick Boven as chair of the Consensus Working Group (CWG) for the Port Future Study.

Mayor Len Brown says Dr Boven brings a wealth of experience gained in New Zealand and abroad, in both the public and private sectors.

“Rick Boven is an extremely experienced strategist and facilitator with a strong grounding in environmental management, infrastructure and transport topics”

“The CWG has a multi-faceted role in creating a long-term strategy for the Port. It must carefully provide the scope and direction for this complex piece of work, whilst maintaining a strong working relationship with the sector’s stakeholders.

“We feel that Rick is the right person to steer this ship,” he says.

Chair of the Auckland Development Committee Deputy Mayor Penny Hulse welcomes Dr Boven’s extensive governance, policy and business consulting experience.

“Rick has a great mix of skills alongside qualifications in environmental management, change management and business.

“This brings wide experience in building shared understanding of proposed new strategies, developing consensus and a readiness to act within leadership teams and boards.

“Most recently he has been a member of the Independent Review Panel of the Tai Timu Tai Pari – Sea Change project,” says Ms Hulse

Dr Boven says he is excited about this new challenge and privileged to lead such a significant project on behalf of Auckland.

“I’m looking forward to getting to know all of the stakeholders who will be involved and to working together with them to develop a fact-based proposed solution using a consensus driven and collaborative process.

“The future of the Port is an issue of importance to many Aucklanders. I am committed to leading a professional and in-depth study which provides recommendations back to Council that fully takes account of the views of our varied communities,” says Dr Boven.

At its meeting on 14 May, the Auckland Development Committee unanimously endorsed a collaborative process for undertaking the Port Future Study. This included the Governing Body-lead appointment of an independent chairperson to chair the Consensus Working Group.

As independent chair, Dr Boven’s role will be to ensure the principles of collaboration are applied across both groups involved in the Study, manage the various stakeholders and oversee the work and recommendations that will be made to the council.

The next step in setting up the framework for the Study is to establish a Stakeholder Reference Group (SRG) and Consensus Working Group (CWG).

Overall, the Port Future Study will provide a collaborative process, without political involvement, that will consider economic, cultural, social and environmental costs and benefits of a range of options for the future long-term strategy of port development, including alternative port locations and reconfigurations.

The SRG will be made up of 40 to 50 representatives from a broad range of sectors and interests.

It will represent its various stakeholders, communicate back to organisations within the sector and undertake work requested by the CWG as needed. The 12-15 members of the CWG will be self-selected from this Stakeholder Reference Group.

The role of the CWG is to finalise and agree the study scope, provide direction and decisions as required, identify work to be undertaken and make recommendations to the Auckland Council on the way forward.

More information on the proposed stakeholder engagement process and draft scope of the Port Future Study can be found here

http://infocouncil.aucklandcouncil.govt.nz/Open/2015/05/AUC_20150514_AGN_5976_AT.PDF

 

About Dr Rick Boven

Dr Rick Boven’s background spans social science research, business consulting, economics and environment management.  He works as a strategist for government, commercial and not-for-profit organisations.

Rick has wide commercial experience including leading strategy projects with many SOEs, with transport and infrastructure companies, in New Zealand and internationally.

He has worked with Australian and New Zealand central and local governments, including Auckland Council, on economic and commercial strategies, infrastructure and organisational change topics.

He also has a background in governance, research, university teaching and publications across economics, business, social science and environment.

This includes 15 years as a director of ASB Bank, a long term director of Sovereign insurance, director of The New Zealand Institute, a founding partner of Boston Consulting Group in NZ and a Chartered Fellow of the New Zealand Institute of Directors.

He has a PhD in Environmental Management, a Masters of Business Administration, a Masters in Psychology and a degree in Sociology.

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As a side note in relation to the Court challenge against Port of Auckland on the Bledisole extensions we won’t the that result for a couple of weeks. More as that happens.