The Politics behind the issue or of the day
Councillors rightfully concerned UPDATE: Broken Links repaired. Apologies folks While my podcast about the Mayor and the Congestion Free Network did go up this morning (Question to Len Brown: … Continue reading Podcast: Follow Up to Questions for the Mayor on the Congestion Free Network
Seems we are already missing targets The Special Housing Accord was designed to get housing supply in Auckland moving with a target of 39,000 consents all done and … Continue reading Housing Going Awry – Again?
Well some could say this was coming.
From Auckland Council
Auckland Council’s Governing Body today made a decision to postpone the passing of the Air Quality Bylaw. The proposed bylaw aims to manage indoor fires to reduce air pollution and meet National Environmental Standards for Air Quality (AQNES).
Councillors agreed that further discussion was needed with the government to meet their legislative requirement and garner support for the large number of Aucklanders this bylaw will affect.
Councillor Calum Penrose, Chair Regulatory and Bylaws Committee says, “We have over 80,000 households in Auckland that currently use open fires and old wood burners. We would like the government to work with us in providing people with clean heat alternatives and support the more vulnerable in our community whose only form of heating is open fires.”
Cr Penrose recognised that the proposed bylaw needs to be put through to meet the AQNES and also for the overall health of the wider Auckland community – 110 people dying a year from illnesses due to fine particle emissions from indoor fires is another vital reason to rectify this problem.
The proposed Air Quality Bylaw will go back to the Regulatory and Bylaws Committee in February 2015 with further clarification on support for alternative heating options. The overall timeframe of an indoor fire ban in late 2018 is not expected to change.
—Ends—
And I bet all the Government will do for “support” on alternative heating options is garner the big stick rather than rebates and subsidies. So might as well get the Bylaw through and be done with it. We have until 2018.
My last piece of commentary on it was here: Fire Places – Heated? Actually No
The new Bylaw to place restrictions and bans on pre 2005 wood burners in Auckland homes has been kicked into touch – February 2015 looking at Twitter and MSM reports.
Council is due to release more details later on today.
No matter the delays however, the City is still faced with the inevitable. We either get the Bylaw in ourselves under our own steam or have it done for us by the Ministry for the Environment.
More as it happens
All About Auckland Looks at the Debate The All About Auckland Show has been covering the Valuations, and Rates debate. You can see the full video here: Valuations and Your … Continue reading Valuations and Your Rates
One thing that I will ping National on is that some Ministers (Joyce, Smith, and even English at the moment (which is a shame)) thinking only on one dimensional terms rather than three dimensional terms.
I do not know what it is with Centre Right Parties here, Australia, the USA, and the UK when it comes to the difference between physical and social infrastructure. They can see physical infrastructure no problem but social infrastructure it seems they can not simply understand for the life of them.
Social infrastructure is as critically important as the physical infrastructure. If you lack the Social Infrastructure at State level we return to the Classic Liberal era of 19th Century Britain and the wild economic swings that would bring about Social Liberalism and the Welfare State up until the 1990’s.
Let me put it in a final form. A society that disconnect will prompt civil unrest and later wars. History has shown that to us again and again.
Time for National to take a history less fast.
One of the key responsibilities of incumbent upon Government is the provision of infrastructure.
This includes building railways roads, hospitals, power grids and policing, which forms an intrinsic part of our social infrastructure.
This government has been big on building.
It has spent unprecedented amounts of money on building transport infrastructure, things such as roads and railway lines as it sees these things, quite rightly, as the arteries, veins and capillaries of the New Zealand Economy. This is well and good, but over the last six years the National Government and its allies, which include the Maori Party, has consistently failed to acknowledge the historic and contemporary under-investment in social infrastructure.
To answer a question that the Government has only just noticed, but has been around for decades, Bill English has announce that the Government is looking to sell state houses. The logic seems to be that selling state houses…
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I suppose this is a lesson on not giving a Public Authority a “lead” on a public art project as this Herald article from Bernard Orsman shows below:
The cost of the State House sculpture on Auckland’s Queens Wharf blew out to $1.924 million before being scaled back to $1.5 million, papers show.
Documents released under the Official Information Act to the Herald show the original plan was for the project to be finished in the first few months of this year. The completion date was later revised to February 2015 and is now some time beyond that.
Auckland Council announced plans for the sculpture in March last year, to be funded by a $1 million donation from Barfoot & Thompson, marking the company’s 90 years in business.
The documents show the cost of the sculpture – a “scaled version of a Mount Eden state house” by renowned artist Michael Parekowhai – had reached $1.9 million by May 2013.
Images of the sculpture have been shared with councillors but not the public, causing widespread criticism.
In February, Parekowhai told council public art manager Carole Anne Meehan he did not want early concept drawings and photos of a model to be “distributed publicly by anyone attending” a council meeting.
But several images were leaked to the Herald. They show a typical state house with external stairs leading to a platform offering multiple views of the chandelier filling the interior.
They also show a skylight, to allow cruise ship visitors berthing at Queens Wharf to peer inside the brilliantly coloured and intricate glass garden of native birds, flowers and insects inside the house that will glow softly at night.
A council source said if the council wanted to stuff up the sculpture it could not have done a better job.
Today, council chief operating officer Dean Kimpton said there was no fault with the process, but acknowledged it would have been better to have released images earlier.
He said the design had gone through a number of iterations, saying images and construction dates would be made public in mid-December.
“It is what it is. The design process has taken longer … and we have got a great result from Michael [Parekowhai]. I think the public are going to love it. I’m not anticipating a public backlash,” he said.
Asked about ratepayers underwriting up to $500,000 after the cost ballooned above the initial $1 million budget, Mr Kimpton was confident of attracting sponsorship once images, a story to wrap around it and a building deadline were made public.
He confirmed rumours that other suppliers were being considered for the chandelier, including glassworks in the United States and New Zealand, “but it is likely to be constructed in Italy”.
The documents show that Parekowhai was recommended “after careful consideration” as the “only candidate” for the artwork in late November 2012 after a shortlist of 11 potential artists, whose names were redacted, was drawn up.
Said Ms Meehan on November 26, 2012: “This is the right moment for a significant commission for Auckland by him [Parekowhai], as national and international recognition of his work is climbing.” She also recommended moving the sculpture from the cityside of Queens Wharf, a location “sabotaging” its potential, to the water’s edge at the end of the wharf.
The latest breakdown for the $1.5 million project, includes $705,000 for the chandelier, $415,000 for the building, an artist’s fee of $225,000 and $155,000 for a contingency and development costs.
A council document, dated May 15, says the project is a given and will not go out for public consultation in the new 10-year budget.
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Source: http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11347859
The whole thing seems Gold Plated and an absolute disaster in handling since day one! Misinformation and lack of clear concise information from Council is certainly not helping either and this will feed on to other projects whether it be public art or something else.
The Auckland District Court has ruled that the Council is free to apply at the High Court to sell activist Penny Bright’s house to collect the Rates arrears going back to 2008.
From Radio NZ
Updated at 6:38 pm on 24 October 2014
Penny Bright.
The one-time mayoral candidate and self-styled anti-corruption campaigner owes $33,000 after not paying rates since 2008.
Ms Bright has long declared her refusal to pay rates, saying the council is declining to disclose financial information which she has requested.
She went to the Auckland District Court asking for a stay on an earlier judgment allowing the Council to sell her half-million dollar home.
In his decision Judge Simon Menzies said Ms Bright’s position is that she refuses to meet her rates payments, not that she is unable to.
And he said her argument that the council should reveal how it spends its money has no bearing on the court’s jurisdiction.
Auckland Council can now ask the High Court to go ahead with a sale process.
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Source: http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/regional/257740/house-can-be-sold-over-unpaid-rates
So the ball is back in Auckland Council’s court. That said CEO Stephen Town said he was not seeking a sale just yet as noted here: Penny Bright Not Going to Lose Her Home – Yet
The Saga continues
From Auckland Council
Auckland Council CEO Stephen Town has today written to Penny Bright making it clear that the forced sale of her house because of her long-term overdue rates arrears was not the council’s preferred course of action.
Legal proceedings to recover the $33,288.25 of her outstanding arrears would result in the sale of her Kingsland house. Ratings sales are rare as most ratepayers with overdue rates make suitable arrangements with council to pay.
Mr Town says that in her case, as with other outstanding rate arrears cases, the council would prefer to resolve the payment without having to resort to legal action.
In his letter, Mr Town has reminded Ms Bright of the options available to pay her rates which includes a rates postponement.
Council has provisionally assessed her rates arrears situation against the criteria for a postponement of rates and concluded that this option would be available to Ms Bright. This would be on the basis that she applies and is willing to meet and adhere to the requirements of a repayment scheme.
“Ms Bright has today indicated her interest in a rates postponement option. We have provided her with a way forward and the name of a senior council staff member who can assist. The ball is now in her court,” says Mr Town.
“The council has a responsibility to ensure there is a fairness and equity in the payment of rates for all ratepayers and we have tried for over seven years to encourage Ms Bright to pay her rates.”
To date, 20,051 Auckland ratepayers have qualified for a rates rebate and council has agreed to a rates postponement for 337 households.
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And the saga rolls on
Note: This does not include reaction to the Air Quality debate as any resentment should be directed at Government where the order came from – not Council who are simply complying with central legislation
It was brought up in conversation over the Long Term Plan that criticisms and resentment towards the Council seems to be more naked, concentrated, and getting rather well-informed than the usual junk you can see often being flung. What makes the criticism more concentrated and naked is that once residents understand how the rating system works they hone their criticisms rather sharply back at the Council. So is such criticism warranted towards the Governing Body or is the City over reacting to the large and wider situation at play.
My own reaction (in-lieu of the discussion) was:
The City is openly critical for three reasons
What is fuelling the criticisms along is the 21 Local Boards send a sharp letter to the Mayor as we can see here: Local Boards Fire Shot Over Mayor’s Bow
If you are looking for a Councillor’s sharp criticism – with me replying back twice then I leave you this from Councillor Chris Fletcher:
Endless meetings and workshops are being held in a desperate attempt to reconcile the Mayor’s 10 year budget with Auckland’s community aspirations. The public were sold a pup during the unitary plan process. It did not duly consider the cost of meeting infrastructure investment with population growth. Furthermore planners were working on a different set of data from infrastructure providers. Now in desperation we are trying to ration sparse resources to ensure we can meet our responsibilities. This has translated into an unacceptable proposal to cut parks and sports investment by nearly 40% over the next 10 years. All of this could have been avoided if there had been leadership in managing the statutory processes bringing policy and funding together in the Auckland Plan, LTP and Unitary Plan.
Alternative sources of funding have been pointed out to the Council to supplement the rates stream also seen here:https://voakl.net/2014/10/21/questions-around-land-sales/ (you were absent Councillor – I believe at the late Mark Ford’s funeral?) More can be seen here:https://voakl.net/…/the-reaction-to-my-presentation-to…/
The alternatives and way forward is all there for the Governing Body, whether the Governing Body advances into the 21st Century in thinking, planning and having to go outside the box is yet to be seen
All said if the Minister and Ministry have no idea what is really going on since the Unitary Plan went out for notification then what the heck was in their submission and what are they honestly doing that does not involve blinkers.
Impetus now lays with the Minister
Seems Central Government might be partly to blame for where we are if we take both the Unitary Plan and Long Term Plan in account.
Talking Southern Auckland 