Annual Plan Submission Tool

I have made up this submission tool for anyone wanting to put in a submission. The submission tool covers both the annual plan, local water done well, and the development contributions policy. Also refer to the council consultation document. Submissions close on Monday the 28th of April.

The council submission form is very narrow, and corrals us into a very restricted range of consultation topics. You do not need to be restricted by using the council form. You can submit on any related topic that you are concerned about. That covers a very wide range of topics.

One way around the restrictions is to submit by email, and to include all the topics that you are interested in. I have prepared the draft submission below to cover topics that I am concerned about. They are not necessarily the same topics that you are concerned about, or the same view point, so please use the draft submission as a starting point only.

Instructions To Email A Submission

Open up a blank email to send (compose).

The email should be addressed to submissions@tauranga.govt.nz.

Enter a subject line. It should be something like: Annual Plan Submission.

Add your name, contact phone number, and email address.

Copy and paste the draft submission below into your email.

Edit the draft submission. You can change the text, delete items, or add items, to make up your own submission. Your submission should reflect your own opinions rather than my opinions, so please take the time to edit it to reflect your personal viewpoint. Make it your own.

If you have a specific item that you are interested in, for example you would like a pedestrian crossing on your street, add that in.

Make An Oral Submission

Your submission will carry a lot more weight if you also speak to it (up to 10 minutes), at one of three public hearings. To speak at a hearing, copy and paste the following text, including the text for the hearing you would like to attend, to either the top or bottom of your submission.

I would like to speak to my submission at the hearing on

Copy the text for one of the following three hearings.

Tuesday, 13 May, 9am – 5pm, Tauranga City Council Chambers, Level 1, 90 Devonport Road, Tauranga.
Wednesday 14 May, 1pm – 7pm, Bay Oval, Meeting Room, Kawaka Street, Mount Maunganui.
Thursday 15 May, 9am – 5pm, Tauranga City Council Chambers, Level 1, 90 Devonport Road, Tauranga.

You can also book a hearing, either by phone (577 7000), or by email (submissions@tauranga.govt.nz). You can do this after you have sent in your submission, and you can also cancel your hearing if you change your mind.

Check And Send

Double check that you have done everything, then send.

Note: please do not include anything rude or abusive in your email.

Draft Submission

Dear Mayor and Councillors

Local Water Done Well

Water should be retained in house. Council should concentrate on improving in house management of water, and controlling costs. Council should continue to partner with Western Bay, but only in specific cases where there is a tangible benefit to both parties.

The calculated benefits from having a multi council CCO (Council controlled Organisation), are wildly optimistic. Council has a history of overly optimistic business case calculations which are used to justify a preferred option, and which over promise in theory, but under deliver in practice. This time is not going to be different. The actual result is likely to be a significant increase in water costs, rather than the promised savings.

Tauranga already has one of the best water departments in the country. It would be a pity to lose that expertise. Council should make the most of the expertise it already has.

The main reason for the preferred option, a multi council CCO, appears to be the additional debt headroom. Tauranga already has too much debt. Council should not be opting for a multi council CCO in order to take on more debt.

Annual Plan

Total annual rates increases should be capped at 3% maximum, with a target of 0%, including growth, water, user charges and levies etc.

For the two $100 questions (capex and opex), council has not provided enough information to allow submitters to make informed decisions about which areas should be funded, and by relatively how much. The two $100 questions are not very relevant, and do not allow for a proper response.

Capex spending: Capex spending should be more cost effective. Capex costs are multiple times higher than they should be. Capex spending should be re prioritised by council to concentrate on essentials rather than nice to haves. The Domain stadium and the Memorial Park Aquatic centre should be scrapped. The memorial hall and the Queen Elizabeth Youth Centre should be retained. The Otumoetai pool should be retained. All vanity projects should be scrapped. Operational costs should not be classified as capital costs.

Opex spending: Opex spending should be cut, and re prioritised by council. The $100 should be drastically reduced. Council should concentrate on core services. Cut staff, consultants, publicity, advertising, communication and media, charities, grants, contributions and sponsorship, creative arts funding, wellness, Iwi contributions (not the full list). Opex spending should be more cost effective.

General spending: All council spending should be re prioritised based on a thorough review to eliminate non essential and wasteful spending. Council should conduct a bottom up, line by line review of all spending. Procurement processes should be fixed – procurement costs are often multiple times higher than they should be. The preferred vendor strategy does not work. Council should concentrate on essentials, rather than nice to haves. Value for money should be a real objective, rather than just a slogan.

Tauranga Council has too much debt. Council should live within its budget, and focus on core activities and infrastructure. Council should not just increase the debt limit to allow excess spending. Council should adopt prudent financial policies, and control spending. Capital costs should be controlled so that council is not paying well over the market rate for infrastructure projects (sometimes by a factor of 2, 3, 4, 5 or more times the market rate). Operational spending should not be classified as capital spending so that it can be put on debt.

Council should always consider ratepayer affordability when making decisions. “Tauranga is an affordable city” should be added as a community outcome. The community outcomes should be reviewed and updated.

Conduct a deep review of the council organisation to improve efficiency and effectiveness. There are too many managers and too many staff. The ratio of managers to staff is too high (1 manager to 4.9 staff). The ratio should be 1 to 10 or 1 to 12 or higher. Scrap all unnecessary activities and related staff. Bring technical expertise back in house. Restore the career path for technical people. Recruit and train younger staff. Concentrate on delivery of core services, rather than on non essentials like communication and public media. Council should be restructured to reflect the changing priorities.

Effective organisations must have good governance and good management. Conduct an independent review of the performance of council governance and management.

Stop paying for Priority One. Scrap public private partnerships, and the related staff. Review the effectiveness and impartiality of Smart Growth.

Do a deep review of council CCOs. Do we really need so many CCOs? They all cost money. Do they deliver for the ratepayers? Would it be more efficient to bring their activity back in house? Does council need better control over their activities?

For years, council has had a reputation for a bad work environment, with difficulty recruiting and retaining staff. Council is required by law to be a good employer. The toxic work environment should be fixed. The council work culture should be restored.

Stop spending so much on consultants. Technical skills should be brought back in house.

Stop planting carex grasses, which are inappropriate in most locations, and increase maintenance costs. Repeal Direct Outcome Measure ODM12, “An increase the proportion of native vegetation cover in urban areas and across the city, increasing from the current 3% to 10% over time”. Carex grass plantings should be reverted back to grass to save maintenance costs.

Memorial park does not need an upgrade. Mount Drury park does not need an upgrade. That is just an excuse to plant carex grasses. Defer all other unnecessary park upgrades.

Tree planting should be reviewed to ensure that the plantings are not going to cause excessive future maintenance costs. For example planting pohutakawa trees on narrow median strips where they are totally unsuitable. Trees should be chosen so that they match the location. Repeal ODM13 “An increase in overall (indigenous and exotic) tree or urban forest canopy cover over time, targeting an overall 30% canopy cover for the city”.

Stop buying properties above market price, with very generous terms for the seller, and selling properties below market price, with very generous terms for the buyer.

The government is planning to scrap the wellness provisions from the local government act. Council should identify all of the wellness costs that can be eliminated by the proposed changes, and be ready to cut those costs as soon as the legislation allows.

Apply a targeted rate to the Pitau Road development at the Mount to cover costs caused by the development.

Development Contributions

Land developers should pay the full costs of growth infrastructure as development contributions. Land development contributions should be calculated individually for each development, taking account of the actual costs for each development. Land development should be optimised to make maximum use of existing infrastructure. Where special infrastructure is required, that should be paid for by the developer. Growth infrastructure should be correctly classified as growth, not level of service or replacement. Land developer subsidies have cost council hundreds of millions of dollars over the years.

The proposed contribution schedules do not allow for special cases which incur significant additional costs. For example, if the development is at a distance from the existing infrastructure, there will be significant extra costs to connect the infrastructure. Those extra costs should be paid for by the developer.

User Fees And Charges

Council should concentrate on increasing effectiveness and efficiency, and reducing waste and unnecessary spending, rather than increasing user fees, and or rates.

Fees and charges to non profit organisations should be eliminated or minimised. Organisations like the Mens Shed, and the businesses, clubs and societies in the historic village should be protected, not forced to close down because of excessive charges. Historic village charges should be reviewed. Small businesses like the whipped baker should be encouraged to return. Why did they leave? The council needs a better long term strategy for the historic village, along with better management. Sports clubs should not be charged out of existence.

Bay Venues operation, and fees and charges should be reviewed. Should Bay Venues be brought back in house? Is council subsidising Bay Venues subsidiary businesses such as Bay Catering, Bay Swim, Bay Fit, Bay Audio etc? Should a private cafe have the lease for the cafe in the new council building instead of Bay Venues? Should Bay Venues be subsidised to compete with local businesses? Should Bay Venues be competing with local business at all?

No entry charges for McLarens Falls Park.

Other

Tauranga should opt out of Local Goverment New Zealand (LGNZ). LGNZ is following its own agenda, and no longer represents the interests of councils.

Find possible commercial opportunities for the cargo shed. Council previously owned the cargo shed and could use it at zero cost, but now has to pay for a lease on the building. Should the cargo shed be leased out to a restaurant, or other business, rather than leave it mostly empty? The same possibly applies to other council properties.

All consultation organisations should pay their own costs, not be subsidised by ratepayers.

Promotional activities for the city centre should be paid for by the Tauranga Main Street targeted rate, the same as for the Mount, Greerton, and Papamoa. They should not be paid for by city wide ratepayers.

Council should be more sympathetic to small business owners in the city.

The annual review of the chief executive should include an independent review of the performance of the council organisation. How can the elected members properly review the CE’s performance, without reviewing the performance of the organisation that he leads. Performance indicators on their own, are not sufficient to review performance. The performance indicators for the council organisation, and for the chief executive should be reviewed and updated. They are not adequate.

Improve council transparency. Minimise the use of public excluded sessions. Privacy should not be used as a justification for not releasing information which is in the public interest. Council should review and revise their transparency policy to maximise the information available to the public. Public interest should override privacy and legal privilege. Council should fully adopt recommendations by the ombudsman.

Council documents should be shorter and more concise, with less padding. Information should be clear, accurate and timely.

Information should be provided to the elected members in a timely manner so they can make good decisions.

All voting members on council or council committees should be elected, not appointed. The issue of non elected voting members on committees should be included in the referendum for Maori Wards. Payments to non elected voting committee members should be made from the elected members remuneration pool, with a corresponding reduction in elected members pay. The names of all committee candidates, records of the public excluded sessions where the candidates were nominated, selected and or approved, and all records of the process should be put in the public domain, including the video record. Any person willing to be nominated for a committee position, should accept that they have entered the public domain. Public interest should override privacy.

In general, council should review all property transactions by the commissioners. Adopt “lessons learned” to prevent and or reduce wasteful spending, and to prevent similar events occurring again. Hold staff, commissioners, and elected members accountable. Where appropriate, council should request that the Auditor General investigate. All records, including public excluded meeting agendas and minutes, legal advice, the names of governance and management involved, and their role should be released to the public domain. Public interest should override privacy and legal privilege. Council should consider taking legal action to recover any monies lost.

The Marine Precinct should not have been sold, Council have admitted that it is a terrible deal. Council should assist the Auditor General review of the council decisions and processes that allowed the sale to go ahead.

Council should not have intervened on behalf of the developer in the Rowesdale extension subdivision. Council should request that the Auditor General review the council decisions and processes that occurred during the intervention by council.

Extend the coastal pathway along the sand dunes, from the end of Marine Parade, to Domain Road in Papamoa.