[TTOpotikiCoast] Opotiki Council Draft Annual Plan process 2010

[reafnz]

Kia ora Transition Towns folk.

Firstly I wish to acknowledge the consistent and most excellent
Opotiki News articles that Kazel has been posting. Really amazing down
to earth stuff that I learn something from each week.

Secondly, its that time of year when Opotiki Council asks its over
rated citizens to have a say on their plans. I don't know about you
but I shake my head in bewilderment to see the kind of decisions
Council continues to make. Maybe its just me that envisages a
different future, but
I've included here one of my Submission emails to Council. If others
of you feel inspired to write something then email tra...@odc.govt.nz
before May 18.

Kia Ora Opotiki District Council,

I wish to make submission on a few aspects of the draft plan. My goal
here is really more about encouraging both expenditure in alignment
with current agreed Community principles and ‘thinking outside the
square’.
It is foreseen that doing the same old things year after year will not
solve any social, economic or environmental problems that beset our
community at present.

I am only going by what I have read in the April Council Panui and
have no doubts that on closer inspection of Draft Plans and with some
creative thinking applied, the Council could easily achieve better
outcomes and even zero rate increases. Some examples might be:-

1. Currently the Council litter team are on the job daily picking up
after the kids at the new Water Park. To build a ‘Strong Community’ I
think that before any more equipment is ‘gifted’ to the Water Park ,
that Council should try and get some value out of their expenditure.
At very least a goal of keeping the area free of litter /graffiti for
a year should be set for users to strive for before more expenditure
is undertaken.
Kids are very trainable. If equipment is just given then it will be
abused – e.g. climbing handle snapped off dive platform, dive platform
over turned, graffiti on seats, mud thrown at signs etc.
I believe Council needs to try and get something back from kids in
return for more equipment – and this will have flow on effects like
being an attractive water park for visitors to use, tourists actually
feeling like returning to Opotiki and so on.

2. Council have achieved a Resource Consent to build two Harbour Walls
that would give a 4 m CD navigatable channel entrance. My
understanding is that this is more than Eastern SeaFarms itself
initially spoke of – I recall they talked of a 2m CD channel being
sufficient for their purposes.

At the current stage of development I believe efforts and finances for
harbour development should now go toward improving the entrance we
have using barge mounted water pumps to flocculate the fine sand on an
outgoing tide so as to achieve a 2m CD channel entrance for boats.
Until Industry needs are more defined I believe rate payers have
already taken a significant Industry supporting step (far more than we
contribute to other big industries like Kiwifruit) and now, like a
game of tennis, we need to wait and see where the return ball is
heading for.
The MOU with SeaFarms is a two sided document and surely ratepayers
have demonstrated their good faith part of the agreement.
As mussel processing becomes more mechanised, for all we know huge
purpose built factory ships might be used that process harvested
mussels directly at sea and then when full, transport the frozen
product up to a container shipping port, negating any need for major
Harbour development.
I request that Councillors decide on a cautionary approach to further
Harbour development until Industry (including oil Industry) needs are
known with some certainty.

3. Stormwater pipes in Bridge Str.,
It has always seemed to me that this low lying land next to the car
yards with main road frontage would in fact make an ideal eel pond
farming site with attached tourism buildings along the lines of the
popular Prawn farm development out of Taupo.
I request Council stop doing the normal ‘tidy town’ things and start
thinking outside the square, instead invest some of the monies that
would have been spent on pipes into developing plans for a major
employment, export and tourism centre, form a partnership with Maori/
Chinese/Japanese/Dutch if need be, but start sowing the seeds of
enterprise that will help ratepayers and give vision and employment
opportunities for our youth. 1 kilo of glass eels grows to 35 to 70
ton of quality product. Heaps of income could be produced for
ratepayers.

4. Te Kaha Toilets soakage fields. We advertise ‘Opotiki By Nature’,
and spend $272 000 on Tourism and Promotion. We need to act
consistently. To put in toilet soakage fields for a public toilet,
has got to be a most polluting thing to do. Tourists know the dangers
of leaching field tiled WCs, especially by the coast. DOC installs
excellent composting toilets in its parks and these are accepted by
tourists as being eco-preferable to flush type toilets. Ring planted
with native trees these toilets will become true ‘Opotiki by Nature’
toilets.
They toilets are probably also more aligned with Maori cultural values
than flush type toilets.

As I have stated I’m sure Council could pick up any item from the
Draft plan, brainstorm it with outside the square thinking, consult on
it in a spirit of acting for the whole community, and come up with
different and often cost saving solutions.

Yours faithfully,
Lloyd Hosken


Lloyd Hosken
104 Ford Str.,
Opotiki 3122

Home: 0064 7 3155831
Cell: 027 350 4910


Web presence
www.reaf.org.nz



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