LG Magazine 1409

3 3 33 33 333 3333 33 33 3 33 What local government 33 3 wants p14 333 333 333 33 3

NZ LOCAL GOVERNMENT MAGAZINE VOL 51 • SEPTEMBER 2014 • $8.95

ELECTION SPECIAL TARARUA’S BLAIR KING

On reflecting community values p22

INTEGRATION ROCKS

How ATEED is smashing silos and driving economic growth p26

COLLECTIVE CLOUT

LGNZ conference take-outs p32

WINNERS WINNERS WINNERS The best projects in the land p36

IN THIS ISSUE NZ LOCAL GOVERNMENT MAGAZINE

P14

IN THIS ISSUE P26CONTENTS REGULARS

FEATURES

2 Editor’s Letter 4 In Brief 10 Around the Councils 12 Innovations 13 Events 38 Next Steps 45 LGNZ

14 E LECTION SPECIAL

COLUMNISTS 40 J eremy Elwood

On the Funny Stuff 41 F rana Divich On Legal Issues 43 M alcolm Abernethy From Civil Contractors New Zealand 44 L awrence Yule From LGNZ

ON THE COVER Election Special, What local government wants. See page 14.

P36 What local government wants 26 I NTEGRATION ROCKS

How ATEED is smashing silos and driving economic growth 29 W ISING UP ON WATERWAYS

G reater Wellington’s flood protection project 32 C OLLECTIVE CLOUT

LGNZ’s annual conference 36 W INNERS

The best projects in the land

MY VIEW 22 B LAIR KING

On reflecting your community’s values

P22 SEPTEMBER 2014 LOCAL GOVERNMENT MAGAZINE

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EDITOR’S LETTER NZ LOCAL GOVERNMENT MAGAZINE

Strong regional economic growth.

It’s what we all want.

One thing is abundantly clear. If our country wants to keep growing its economy, we’ve got to drop the ‘us and them’ blame-game that muddies the waters and hampers constructive debate. The regions must not be abandoned to solve their issues alone. And, vice versa, the growth problems of the big cities must concern us all.

What local government wants – the none-too-subtle line on this magazine’s cover – is a combined national approach to solving its problems. LGNZ made that call loud and clear when it launched its manifesto to an incoming government at its recent annual conference – one of the sector’s highlight events of the year.

One of the seven key strategic policies calls on central government to work with LGNZ to develop a joint strategy to strengthen our country’s regional economies.

So for this month’s cover story we’ve gone out to mayors around the country to ask what this could mean for them in practice. Their responses reaffirm their commitment to this national approach and underscore the vast and varied number of issues they face: from the need for better broadband in Buller to resolving forestry issues in the Far North.

On a personal note, I spelt out my own manifesto – although I doubt it justifies being given such a grand name – in my first issue of this magazine. It centres on celebrating the good stuff in local government while also getting real and true about what could be

PUBLISHER Contrafed Publishing Co. Ltd, Suite 2.1, 93 Dominion Rd, Mount Eden, Auckland 1024 PO Box 112 357, Penrose, Auckland 1642 Phone: 09 636 5715, Fax: 09 636 5716 www.contrafed.co.nz GENERAL MANAGER Kevin Lawrence DDI: 09 636 5710 Mobile: 021 512 800 kevin@contrafed.co.nz EDITOR Ruth Le Pla Mobile: 021 266 3978 ruth@localgovernmentmag.co.nz BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT Peter Corcoran DDI: 07 825 7557 Mobile: 021 272 7227 peter@localgovernmentmag.co.nz CONTRIBUTORS Graeme Campbell, Jeremy Elwood, Frana Divich, Malcolm Abernethy, Lawrence Yule ADMINISTRATION/SUBSCRIPTIONS admin@contrafed.co.nz DDI: 09 636 5715 PRODUCTION Design: Tracey Asher DDI: 09 636 5713 design@contrafed.co.nz Printing: PMP MAXUM

done better.

Certainly for the first part of that equation, timing couldn’t have been better. We’re knee-deep in the awards season where, mid-way through the calendar year, the stories of great and grand

CONTRIBUTIONS WELCOME

achievements are calibrated and celebrated.

Please contact the editor before sending them in. Articles in Local Government Magazine are copyright and may not be reproduced in whole or in part without the permission of the publisher.

Most award-winning entries show how the wider local government community pools its resources to make good stuff happen. That’s everything from working alongside small groups of local people to harnessing the power of national and international consultants on projects daylighting streams, revitalising roads and maintaining wastewater services.

So expect to hear more of those voices in future issues as we focus on the stuff that’s making a difference right throughout our country.

Ruth Le Pla, Editor ruth@localgovernmentmag.co.nz

DISCLAIMER Local Government Magazine is an independent publication owned and produced by Contrafed Publishing.

The views expressed in the magazine are not necessarily those of any of its shareholding organisations.

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IN BRIEF

Merged ITOs emerge as Connexis The Infrastructure Industry Training Organisation (ITO) created following the merger between InfraTrain and the Electricity Supply ITO (ESITO) has officially launched as Connexis. Serving the wider infrastructure industry, the new organisation is a ‘one stop shop’ providing training, qualifications and support initially for the civil construction, electricity supply and telecommunications sectors.

Connexis is led by a board of directors (including representation from both civil construction and electricity supply), chaired by Frances Hague and a new chief executive Helmut Modlik.

Hague says the new name is modern, dynamic and reflective of the new organisation. “Our name was developed from ‘connection’ and ‘nexus’ and represents the importance we place on our connection with

employers, trainees and industry and the crucial central role of training.”

Modlik says industries concerned with infrastructure, “underpin and enable everything and everyone else”.

“Local government is a major infrastructure asset owner and investor. As a result it has a strong interest in ensuring those responsible for building and maintaining those assets are appropriately qualified and competent.”

He adds that a key challenge for local government over the next few years will be competing in an increasingly crowded and competitive market for contractors and skilled labour.

“Connexis remains committed to becoming an invaluable partner for local government in meeting the skills challenge.”

Red zones up for discussion The public has the opportunity to say what it wants in regards to the future use of one of Canterbury’s red zones under a government initiative called Canvas.

The first locality under review in the CERA-run programme is Waimakariri District’s residential red zones, an area of around one square kilometre (or 74 rugby fields plus 1800 tennis courts) with a bit of space left over (according to Transport Minister Gerry Brownlee) – taking in Kaiapoi, Kairaki and Pines beaches.

This particular red zone is the first under the Canvas scheme because it is so small, making the essential infrastructure required more easily identifiable, including how horizontal infrastructure within the red zones might be repaired, maintained or removed, as

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well as issues like flood mitigation.

Next up is public input and it is hoped that individuals and groups will take great advantage of this opportunity to have a say as there has already been considerable interest in the future of the residential area, says Waimakariri District mayor David Ayers.

Of the 1048 properties red-zoned in the Waimakariri District, owners of just 36 properties have chosen not to accept a voluntary offer from the Crown.

Details of the campaign – supported by key agencies and strategic partners including the Waimakariri District Council, the Christchurch City Council and Te Rūnanga O Ngāi Tahu – can be found at www. canvasredzone.org.nz.

Asset recycling – a smart option?

SOLGM award honours Glenn Snelgrove Glenn Snelgrove, longstanding former chief executive officer of Western Bay of Plenty District Council, receives SOLGM’s Distinguished Management Award for his outstanding contribution to advancing local government management. The award honours members who embody the key characteristics of professional excellence in the sector.

Presenting the award at the SOLGM Chief Executive’s Forum in Wellington recently, SOLGM president Barbara McKerrow says that for nearly 30 years Snelgrove has dedicated himself to his district.

“That dedication has led to improvements that will benefit the community for years to come,” she says.

“It is clearly evident that he not only met our award criteria, but through an unwavering commitment to Western Bay of Plenty as well as the wider local government sector, he has truly exceeded them.”

This is only the 10th time a Distinguished Management Award has been bestowed on a SOLGM member in the society’s 17-year history. The award was last presented in 2011 to then Auckland Council manager democracy services Darryl Griffin. Griffin is now manager governance and civic services at Christchurch City Council.

Snelgrove retired from his role as Western Bay of Plenty District Council chief executive in May this year after 25 years at the helm. Miriam Taris, the council’s former group manager of corporate and planning services, is the new CEO.

A leading law firm providing legal advice in all principal areas of the law for public, corporate and private clients across New Zealand and beyond. www.brookfields.co.nz

Stephen Selwood is calling on Christchurch and Auckland councils to embrace asset recycling. Selwood, CEO of the New Zealand Council for Infrastructure Development, says asset recycling through a partial or full sell-down of capital in existing assets to fund identified new assets for the community has been used successfully in Australia. The approach delivers much-needed investment in the face of initial public concern.

“For example, the sale of Newcastle Port was eventually embraced in New South Wales after it was made clear that proceeds would be directed into infrastructure and the rejuvenation of Newcastle city.

“The public were thus able to consider in a tangible way whether they wanted a revitalised central city and new and better infrastructure or to maintain ownership in the port.”

Selwood says the recently-released Cameron Partners report on options for managing Christchurch’s financial challenges highlights asset recycling as a smart alternative.

“By recycling capital tied up in existing assets, Christchurch will improve its capacity to invest in a productive, innovative and world-class city,” he says.

“The Auckland Council could accelerate investment in much-needed transport infrastructure by doing the same.”

Selwood says local communities demand transparency. “They need a clear understanding of what assets will be sold, where and how the money will be reinvested, and what the social and economic payback will be. What the national community demands is that locals contribute fairly towards projects which call upon national resources but which also have significant local benefits.”

Convention Centre developer The preferred developer for Christchurch’s new Convention Centre Precinct is Plenary Conventions NZ, a consortium of Ngai Tahu Property and Carter Group.

The project remains on track for construction to begin in 2015, and for the centre to be open for business in 2017.

Beyond the Convention Centre complex, the precinct is likely to combine hotel accommodation, hospitality, retail, and commercial and residential uses.

The Crown has committed $284 million to the project. For more information visit www.ccdu.govt.nz/projects-and-precincts/conventioncentre-precinct.

Contacts: AUCKLAND Ph: 09 379 9350 Melinda Dickey Andrew Green Linda O’Reilly John Young

WELLINGTON Ph: 04 499 9824 Andrew Cameron

SEPTEMBER 2014 LOCAL GOVERNMENT MAGAZINE

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IN BRIEF

Survey reveals the significant cost of conflict Conflict takes more of a toll in public sector organisations than it does in private sector companies. That’s according to a new survey by conflict management specialists FairWay Resolution which surveyed a crosssection of 740 employees from the public and private sector in a range of industries.

FairWay Resolution’s newly-released report “Conflict in New Zealand Workplaces Study” shows significant differences between workplace conflict in the public and private sectors.

Those working in the public sector are significantly more likely than their private sector peers to have had at least one disagreement or argument with someone in a more senior position. They are also more likely to feel stressed by the conflict and more likely to avoid communicating with the other party involved.

Twice as many public sector workers as private sector employees reported that conflict resulted in loss of motivation to do their job.

The survey also shows significantly more public sector than private sector employees feel stressed following conflict (71 percent compared to 47 percent). And not only are public sector workers’ behaviours in response to conflict more negative, but they are also five times more likely to receive a warning than those working in the private sector.

FairWay says conflict management is not a soft skill or a ‘nice-to-have’, but is critical

to optimising the performance of all types of public and private sector New Zealand organisations.

“We found that in the past year, a quarter of employees had at least one disagreement or argument at work that distracted or prevented them from doing their job. Over a third of the disagreements / arguments went on for more than one month suggesting that productivity loss due to conflict in the workplace is significant.”

FairWay says its study shows organisations that invest in equipping their employees’ with the skills to effectively manage conflict, can reduce the risk of lost productivity that arises from conflict in the workplace.

Other impacts of conflict were missing deadlines, loss of confidence and mistakes being made. Respondents reported taking time off as a response to conflict, or leaving the employment by choice or dismissal.

“Clearly a quarter of the workforce producing poorer quality of work, higher absenteeism and loss of focus due to poorly-managed conflict adds up to significant loss of productivity to the New Zealand economy,” says FairWay. Slightly more men than women reported experiencing conflict in the workplace although the nature of conflict experienced by the genders is quite different. Men reported much higher levels of conflict over work-related ideas than women, whereas women were far more likely to experience a

“We found that in the past year, a quarter of employees had at least one disagreement or argument at work that distracted or prevented them from doing their job. Over a third of the disagreements/ arguments went on for more than one month suggesting that productivity loss due to conflict in the workplace is significant.”

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conflict over bullying or a personality clash.

FairWay says that “possibly due to the interpersonal nature of the conflict – rather than work-related conflict – women are considerably more likely than men to seek help or support from people outside the workplace such as family and friends or unions”.

According to FairWay, the survey shows that conflict is not well managed in New Zealand’s workplaces, and highlights the “indirect but significant” cost of failing to manage conflict effectively.

It says smart leaders and organisations avoid power and rights contests, and focus on finding ways to resolve conflicts through reconciling different interests.

“Every organisation has a strategy for resolving conflict that is embedded in its culture, although often the strategy is hard to define. We have also identified that some individuals have a strategy for managing conflict too, unfortunately, involving the wrong reactions of distancing, blaming, justifying and coercion.”

Run that town Want to practise running a town single-handedly? Even better: an Australian town? You can do just that with a free iPhone app from the Australian Bureau of Statistics.

Run That Town lets you take control of any neighbourhood in Australia. The killer deal is you get to work with real 2011 census data. So, you can work out who’s who in your area. Then choose from hundreds of projects for your town – including pools, stadiums, casinos and theme parks – and poll the virtual residents before beginning construction. The local paper will let you know what residents think of your decisions. Popular leaders get ticker-tape parades. Unpopular ones get chased out of town by an angry mob.

The app’s just marking its one-year celebrations. And still, for anyone wanting to test-run what kind of a leader they’ll be, this is as good a dry-run as you’re likely to get.

We have to warn you that reviews aren’t unanimously hot, though. Some people say problems start when they try to load census data. All of which sounds a bit like real life, really. http://runthattown.abs.gov.au/

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IN BRIEF DATES FOR YOUR DIARY SEPTEMBER 3-5 Building a Better New Zealand conference.

Rendezvous Hotel, Auckland www.buildingabetternewzealand.co.nz/ 3-5 Project Management Institute of NZ (PMINZ) Conference & Awards.

Rydges Latimer Square, Christchurch www.pminzconference.com/ 4 LGNZ Major Issues Seminar: Royalty Payments – the case for a local share.

DLA Philips Fox, Chartered Accountants House, Level 5, 50 - 64 Customhouse Quay, Wellington www.lgnz.co.nz

“It is important that we have an association that represents a balance of small, medium and large players so all voices are heard.”

Dave Connell, now Civil Contractors NZ president.

15 - 16 2014 ALGIM Customer Service Symposium.

SKYCITY Hamilton Function Centre, Hamilton www.algim.org.nz/algim-events/ 17 - 19 Water NZ Annual Conference.

Claudelands Event Centre, Hamilton www.waternz.org.nz/

OCTOBER 9 - 10 SOLGM Local Government Communicators Forum.

James Cook Hotel Grand Chancellor, Wellington www.solgm.org.nz/

“It’s about recognising a collaborative industry – and while there is an increasing optimism out there, we are all facing challenges and it’s still tough in some rural areas. We need now, more than ever, to have a unified, proactive body to rise to these challenges.”

Cos Bruyn, ex Roading NZ president.

NOVEMBER 3-4 SOLGM Funding and Rating Forum.

James Cook Hotel Grand Chancellor, Wellington www.solgm.org.nz/ 12 - 14 SOLGM Annual Summit 2014: Risky Business.

The Dunedin Centre, Dunedin www.solgm.org.nz/ 20 - 21 2014 Auckland Transport Summit.

SKYCITY Convention Centre, Auckland www.conferenz.co.nz/ 23 - 26 2014 International ALGIM Conference & Awards.

Smarter Local Government.

The Langham, Auckland www.algim.org.nz/algim-events/ Would you like us to include your event in this calendar?

Please email details to ruth@localgovernment.co.nz

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ONE VOICE The New Zealand Contractors’ Federation and Roading NZ have merged to form a new industry body for contractors. Civil Contractors New Zealand officially came into being on September 1 after both parties voted to join forces at their recent joint conference in Rotorua.

Both association presidents – Dave Connell, MD of Connell Contractors, and Downer NZ chief executive Cos Bruyn – described the merger as the ‘sensible’ and ‘collaborative’ way forward for the industry. The two industry associations had been considering merging for some time.

Civil Contractors New Zealand’s new executive council comprises: Dave Connell (Connell Contractors) president; Woody Blakely (Blakely Contracting) vice president; Joe Edwards (McConnell Dowell Constructors) past president; Cos Bruyn (Downer NZ) and former Roading NZ chairman; Bailey Gair (Gair Contracting); Colin Caltex (Andrew Haulage); Tony Pike (Fletcher Construction); Brian Warren (Isaac Construction); Bob Fulton (Fulton Hogan); and Leigh Johns (Hynds Pipes) associate representative.

ON THE MOVE Greg Campbell is the new chief executive of WELLINGTON REGIONAL COUNCIL, taking over from David Benham who is retiring after nine years in the role. Campbell has extensive private sector experience, most recently as chief marketing officer and director at Vodafone New Zealand. Previous positions include managing director of the New Zealand Guardian Trust Company and general manager, products and marketing, ANZ Bank. The appointment is for five years.

Stratford District Council chief executive Sue Davidson is shifting to NEW PLYMOUTH DISTRICT COUNCIL as its new chief operating officer. She starts her new role on 8 December. Davidson will lead the delivery of all the council’s frontline services to the community, from major infrastructure such as roads and water to community services such as parks and libraries. She has a background in finance, local government, and strategic and financial consultancy in New Zealand and Australia.

Australasian engineering and design company HARRISON GRIERSON has promoted three senior staff members to technical director roles. Alan Blyde has been promoted to technical director, Wellington. Blyde manages the firm’s Wellington office and is an engineer practising in the company’s land and buildings sector. Specialist structural engineering team leader Andrew Thompson is now technical director, Auckland structural. And David Needham has been promoted to technical director, Tauranga. Needham already manages the firm’s Tauranga office and is an experienced planner with a resource management and development focus.

ROTORUA DISTRICT COUNCIL (RDC) has appointed transition board members to its two new council business units Rotorua Contracting, and Destination Rotorua Marketing, Events, i-SITE and Venues. The new units have been set up following the recent restructuring of RDC’s operational arm to support the ‘Rotorua 2030’ vision, goals and priorities. The transition boards will remain in place until council decides whether or not to transform the business units into councilcontrolled organisations (CCOs).

Rotorua Contracting is headed by interim chief executive Thomas Collé. It’s transition board members are: Leith Comer, chairperson (former CEO, Te Puni Kokiri / Ministry of Māori Development); Ian Boyd (CEO, Te Arawa Group Holdings); Jan Bolton (owner, Kaingaroa Roading Contractors); Israel Hawkins (director, WERA Consultants); and Dave Foster (Rotorua District Council chief financial officer).

Mark Rawson is the interim chief executive of the Destination Rotorua Marketing, Events, i-SITE and Venues business unit. Transition board members are: Alan Bickers, chairperson (management consultant, professional director, former local government manager); Bruce Thomasen (general manager, Skyline Enterprises); Brett Marvelly (owner/operator, Princes Gate hotel); Tim Cossar (Te Puia CEO); Kiri Atkinson-Crean (co-chair, Māori in Tourism Rotorua; sales & marketing GM, Te Puia); and Dave Foster (RDC chief financial officer).

The INSTITUTION OF PROFESSIONAL ENGINEERS NEW ZEALAND (IPENZ) has appointed Kieran Devine as its interim chief executive following the departure of Dr Andrew Cleland who is taking up a new role as chief executive of the Royal Society of New Zealand. An electrical engineer by training, Devine is a highly-skilled leader with 30 years’ experience in the electricity industry.

HAWKINS CONSTRUCTION appointed internal candidate Gary Walker as executive general manager following an extensive search, in New Zealand and overseas by a recruitment specialist. Gary joined Hawkins in 2009 and became Auckland regional manager two years ago. With 30 years industry experience, Gary has worked in a wide range of senior construction and design-related management roles in East Africa, the UK, New Zealand and Australia.

SEPTEMBER 2014 LOCAL GOVERNMENT MAGAZINE

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IN BRIEF

Around the councils TAURANGA CITY COUNCIL will transfer Route K and its tolling operations to the NZ Transport Agency (NZTA) in mid-2015. The move means all but $1 million of the $63 million debt associated with the express bypass will be removed from the council’s books. NZTA’s Waikato Bay of Plenty regional director Harry Wilson says the decision means Tauranga ratepayers will be relieved of the Route K debt and NZTA will be able to commit to electronically tolling Route K and the Tauranga Eastern Link together.

CHRISTCHURCH CITY COUNCIL has released its milestone report on options for managing the financial challenges and maximising the opportunities arising from the earthquakes. The Cameron Partners report says the council may need to find an additional $783 million to $883 million by 2019. The total amount of extra funding required will depend on issues such as the planning of anchor projects, spending on infrastructure repairs, and the level of insurance payments.

Options Cameron Partners proposed for closing the funding gap include increasing rates, borrowing more, maximising insurance payments, and freeing up capital from the council’s commercial assets.

SELWYN DISTRICT COUNCIL is half way through its programme of cemetery repairs following the September 2010 earthquake. Many headstones were damaged in the magnitude 7.1 shake which was centred near Charing Cross about 10 kilometres from Darfield. The council has been working through a staged programme of repairs to fix damage to around 1115 headstones in public cemeteries. The majority of infrastructure repairs in Selwyn have now been completed with all roads, bridges, water and wastewater repairs finished and most community buildings fixed.

TAURANGA CITY COUNCIL and WESTERN BAY OF PLENTY DISTRICT COUNCIL mayors Stuart Crosby and Ross Paterson have agreed on housing accords with Housing Minister Dr Nick Smith. The accords are expected to help provide an additional 1000 homes and sections in Tauranga and 175 homes in the Western Bay of Plenty over the next two years by freeing up the supply of land.

The councils will now identify areas to recommend to the government to be designated as special housing areas. Housing accords are already in place in Auckland, Christchurch and Wellington, and negotiations are underway in Queenstown.

WELLINGTON CITY COUNCIL may select the supplier of its new core IT programme by the end of October. Computerworld New Zealand reports the council recently slimmed down its list of possible vendors to just three. It says the council wants to cut the cost of IT per user from $13,600 to between $4000 and $6000.

The Odyssey project will provide a single platform for core applications compared with the current 120 or more systems. Greater Wellington Regional Council, and Porirua and Upper Hutt City Councils will also take part in Odyssey.

An inner city bike stand embraces street art, recycling and ROTORUA DISTRICT COUNCIL’s WoodFirst policy. The council is set to become the first local authority in New Zealand to adopt the policy which acknowledges the importance of the forestry and wood processing industries to district, regional and national economies.

Made from a large fallen tree, the new piece of street furniture has been installed on the recently upgraded intersection of Rotorua’s Tutanekai and Eruera streets. The bike stand project is a partnership between the council, the Inner City Focus Group and local company Orca Engineering & Marine. Mayor Steve Chadwick says the WoodFirst policy is all about future economic growth. “And, given our location surrounded by forest, it’s also about starting to tell the real story of Rotorua.”

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RUAPEHU DISTRICT COUNCIL is retaining local expertise in deciding on its new vendors for road maintenance services.

Council’s land transport team has been involved in a sixmonth open market tender to decide who would provide Ruapehu’s local road maintenance services worth $10 million a year. Roading is the council’s biggest expenditure item with 32 cents of every rate dollar being spent on land transport.

The land transport contracts are now divided across six separate suppliers: Downer, Jilesens, JJ Walters, Emmetts, Mulch and Mow, and Agspec. The new contracts will come into effect from October 1. The six suppliers will be responsible for nine separate contracts covering all aspects of Ruapehu’s land transport network.

A new independent survey of Rotorua residents reveals an improved perception of the performance of the district’s mayor and councillors. The National Research Bureau (NRB) research shows 61 percent of residents rate the mayor and councillors’ performance as ‘fairly good’ to ‘very good’. This is a jump of 21 percent from last year’s figure of just 40 percent. Seven percent rated their performance as ‘poor’ to ‘not very good’, compared with 20 percent the previous year.

Approval levels for ROTORUA DISTRICT COUNCIL staff were similar to those of elected members, with 62 percent rating employees’ performance as ‘fairly good’ to ‘very good.’ The survey asked residents about their impressions of decisions and actions of the council in the past 12 months and the results were a substantial improvement on the 2013 survey. This year 70 percent approved of recent council decisions and actions compared to last year’s approval by just 53 percent.

Eighty five percent of respondents also felt they had had some influence on decisions that the council had made. Seventy two percent said they were satisfied with how council rates were spent: 22 percent were not. The 2014 NRB survey of public perceptions involved 400 telephone interviews with a cross-section of residents across the district. LG

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INNOVATIONS Rebuild balancing act for local authorities Providing resilient infrastructure at a realistic cost is a key challenge for local authorities working on the Christchurch rebuild. Greg Offer, technical director for environmental engineering at CH2M Beca, says any decisions on earthquake repair methods have to balance resilience objectives against the potential cost of the repairs.

CH2M Beca, a joint venture between Beca and US-based CH2M HILL – a global water and wastewater engineering, construction and operations firm – has led the assessment and repair works at Christchurch Wastewater Treatment Plant since the 2010 earthquake sequence, working in close collaboration with Christchurch City Council.

The work involved risk assessment and prioritisation to get facilities up and running quickly while also addressing long-term repair requirements.

“A useful tool we used for building system resilience was to assess the ‘level of importance’ for each component of a system and its dependence on other assets connected to it,” Offer says. “This allows the treatment for these components to be adjusted to suit the optimal resilience outcome.”

He says the best approach is to design infrastructure assets that function together as a resilient network, with designed levels of backup and redundancy.

“If one part of the system fails then another part can take up the load.”

At Christchurch Wastewater Treatment Plant, the secondary clarifiers were completely knocked out by the February 2011 earthquake. The treatment plant was able to continue functioning

Beca engineers Graeme Wells and Tom Morten at the Christchurch Wastewater Treatment Plant.

without clarifiers by diverting the treatment load to other parts of the process and using some temporary chemical dosing measures.

“While you should consider the worst possible event that could happen to affect the asset/system,” says Offer, “the key is to plan around possible effects instead of designing for them, which is considerably more costly.”

CH2M Beca is working with other councils around New Zealand with asset capacity, criticality and resilience assessments.

Councils team up to lower fleet costs Seven Manawatu and Wanganui councils are working together to better manage their vehicle fleets and improve health and safety.

Horizons Regional Council and Manawatu, Horowhenua, Rangitikei, Ruapehu, Tararua and Wanganui District Councils have installed the EROAD system throughout their combined vehicle fleets under a Local Authority Shared Services (LASS) arrangement.

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The EROAD solution has been rolled out to 21 New Zealand regional and local councils in the past 12 months.

Craig Grant, executive officer, ManawatuWanganui LASS, says that after two months of having EROAD on board, his council is already seeing vehicle efficiencies in the data being collected.

“We’ve never had this level of reporting before. Not only does the information we’re getting tell us how often each vehicle gets used, it also encourages staff to carpool to meetings and provides driver behaviour data if required,” Grant says.

“One of the key functions of EROAD that appealed to us was its GPS ability. A number of our staff work in remote locations,” he says. “If they don’t come back at five, we can

now see where they are and provide help if they need it.”

Lorraine Vincent, chief executive, Manawatu District Council, says EROAD’s system is improving fleet management for her council by automating paper-based processes such as road user charges (RUC) purchases.

“This is making life much easier for staff as they no longer need to remember to check their RUC every few months,” she says.

EROAD CEO Steven Newman says the system collects thousands of vehicle events every minute. “The data our system generates can help local councils run significantly more productive, safe and efficient organisations.”

Each of the seven councils can now see where all the vehicles are in all of the fleets, on one screen.

“We see that as a huge benefit, particularly during emergencies,” Grant says. “We can now capture movements of all seven councils rather than relying on radios to find out where staff are.” LG

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LGNZ’s 2014 conference and inaugural EXCELLENCE Awards in Nelson 1. Shamubeel Eaqub, principal economist, NZIER. 2. Rotorua mayor Steve Chadwick.

9

3. Rod Drury, chief executive, Xero.

4. Minister of Local Government, Paula Bennett.

11

5. Keith Price, councillor, Napier City Council; Rachel Reese, mayor, Nelson City; Faye White, deputy mayor, Napier City Council; Wayne Jack, chief executive, Nelson City Council; and Richard Kempthorne, mayor, Tasman District Council.

6. Smartrak & Stop Tags.

7. Mayors, chairs and deputy mayors.

8. LGNZ president and Hastings mayor Lawrence Yule.

10

9. Kawerau District Council mayor Malcolm Campbell; Bob Fulton, chief operating officer regional business, Fulton Hogan (award sponsor); and Lee Barton, events and community activities team leader, Kawerau District Council.

10. Kapiti Coast District Council mayor Ross Church; LGNZ president Lawrence Yule; and Pat Dougherty, chief executive, Kapiti Coast District Council.

11. Neighbourly being neighbourly.

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12. Hauraki District Council technical services business unit manager Adrian de Laborde; Hauraki District Council mayor John Tregidga; and Michael Mills, director, MartinJenkins (award sponsor).

SEPTEMBER 2014 LOCAL GOVERNMENT MAGAZINE

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ELECTION SPECIAL

What local government wants Working together to boost regional growth When LGNZ launched its election manifesto at its annual conference in Nelson recently it called for the incoming central government to take note of seven key points.

These are the game-changers – the points around which much future success will pivot.

POLICY IN

7

SOUNDBITES

1. G overnance and performance LGNZ president Lawrence Yule says his organisation is committed to raising the standard of governance and performance of local government. “We welcome government support for our programme of initiatives designed to lift the performance of the sector.”

2. Economic growth “New Zealand’s economic growth strategy needs to consider the nation as a whole and the needs of its regions,” Yule says. “We need to find ways to make our regional centres attractive for investment and for skilled migrants to settle. For this to occur there needs to be a shared national strategy. LGNZ is also advocating for the distribution of a share of royalties from mineral, oil and gas extraction to the communities where it takes place.”

3. Sustainable funding “LGNZ seeks that the incoming government consider carefully the findings of the LGNZ Local Government Funding Review, which

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H

igh on the agenda is an unmistakeable call for a combined national approach to developing and growing regions throughout the whole country.

“We need to find ways,” says LGNZ, “to make our regional centres attractive for investment and skilled migrants to settle in.” The manifesto calls for the incoming government to work with LGNZ on developing a joint strategy to strengthen our country’s regional economies.

So Local Government Magazine went out to mayors around the country to ask them what such a change would mean to them. What, we wanted to know, could some elements of that strategy look like? What could an incoming central government do that would make a material and positive difference to their local community? This, in their own words, is what they had to say.

seeks to find a sustainable model for the future as demographic and economic factors continue to change,” Yule says. “As part of this we anticipate the government will pay rates on Crown land.”

4. Infrastructure Good quality infrastructure requires a long-term commitment built on effective asset management planning and ongoing investment. “LGNZ asks that the incoming government ensure that the value of local and regional roads to the economic wellbeing of New Zealand, and the sustainability of road funding for regions, is recognised in the overall allocation of road and transport funding,” Yule says. “We ask that it acknowledges local government’s leadership of strategy concerning potable water, wastewater and stormwater assets and services, with decisions about ownership and management belonging to communities.

We seek to ensure that the Building (Earthquake-prone Buildings) Amendment Bill reflects the different risk profiles of buildings and regions, and takes into account social and economic impacts alongside life safety.”

MAYOR JOHN CARTER

Far North District Council We need a common approach between central and local government on economic growth strategies. The Far North is seriously in need of investment – particularly in areas such as tourism and forestry. Tourism in the region has been lagging as a result of the poor state of the international economy. To stimulate a rebirth in activity will require a commitment from both the public and private sectors and a substantial investment in infrastructure such as roading, water and wastewater.

We have long been concerned that the Far North is being exploited in terms of the current forestry sector policy to export whole logs. And we are looking for value-added processing which would make a more significant return to the local economy.

The Far North has been a frontrunner in mineral exploration. Having already made an investment we would welcome any formula that returns royalties to the area in which any minerals are subsequently extracted.

Anything which will take the pressure off rates has to be a good thing.

5. Regulation “Both central and local government are fully committed to providing regulatory regimes that are effective and do not impose unnecessary costs on communities, so we need a strong relationship with policy setters,” Yule says. LGNZ seeks that the incoming government implement the recommendations of the Productivity Commission’s report “Towards Better Local Regulations”, particularly the development of a “partners in regulation” protocol and a forum to ensure both spheres of government agree and understand intended regulatory outcomes.

LGNZ asks that a joint central local government taskforce be established to review the framework of statuses and regulations impacting on local authorities to remove unintended consequences and unnecessary regulatory costs. It also seeks an alternative to the “joint and several” framework for determining liability.

6. Environment Local government is committed to finding the balance between protecting environmental values and amenities for future

MAYOR BRENDAN DUFFY Horowhenua District Council We should first focus on ensuring central and local government work together on a shared strategy and priorities. Market forces decide where people choose to live, work and play, and at the moment rural and provincial New Zealand is not able to offer the sorts of employment opportunities that metro centres are offering. The agricultural and manufacturing climate has changed and will continue to do so significantly.

The discussion between central and local government is about how, what and who drives the fresh initiatives, and about understanding what the realistic achievable objectives will be.

Investment from central government is critical to the success of any of these discussions. Local government simply cannot go it alone.

New Zealand’s dynamics are changing rapidly and, frankly, reversing a trend may not be the answer. Some of us may well have to accept the inevitable. Communities are shrinking or will do so.

Others will benefit and grow.

I feel strongly the need to understand and learn from international trends as we initiate an elevated level of partnership and discussion. Relevant up-to-date regional data understood and accepted is always a great basis for engineering constructive solutions.

generations while also developing local economies. “LGNZ seeks that the incoming government involve councils in the development of policy and regulations as they affect resource management planning and the setting of priorities for ‘national direction’,” Yule says. LGNZ asks the incoming government to agree that locally-elected representatives, in consultation with citizens, should remain the primary decision-makers on plans and policies under the Resource Management Act (RMA).

7. Local democracy “Local government is an important part of New Zealand’s constitutional arrangements providing both local services on behalf of its communities and effective local democracy,” Yule says. LGNZ seeks the incoming government implement the recommendations of the Online Voting Working Party established by the Minister of Local Government and provide funding to assist with the development of online voting and the promotion of triennial local authority elections.

For more information go to: www.lgnz.co.nz

SEPTEMBER 2014 LOCAL GOVERNMENT MAGAZINE

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ELECTION SPECIAL

MAYOR JOHN FORBES Opotoki District Council Economic progress will be maximised when community and business work closely together. Community provides the social licence for business to operate while business provides the economy that enables communities to function.

Business is clearly focused on opportunity, including economic development: usually from the perspective of their outputs. A community’s view of economic development usually manifests itself through local and regional government’s thinking which is as often diffuse as it is focused. This is natural as councils have a wide range of functions which tend to dissipate clear focus on a particular area. Central government also has a major interest in regional economic development as increased economy / GDP impacts on national performance. Central and local government provide the infrastructure that enables economic and productivity gains so they are critical players in the space.

Proactive regions have developed regional development plans that take account of regional strength, infrastructure, resources and skills. It will require a high level of collaboration between central government and regions to turn good local ideas into increased economy / GDP. It may involve some risk but providing the environment and infrastructure for economic development to proceed will produce rewards.

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MAYOR MENG FOON Gisborne District Council Gisborne has a number of needs from any government.

• We need more effort on our roading network as the heavy trucks are giving them a pounding.

• We ask the government to ensure that mining of oil and gas in our region is going to be safe. And we want the government to have resources available for clean-up should things go wrong.

• We want royalties from oil and gas to help cover the cost of increased use of our roads and bridges and note that both NZ First and Labour promise royalties.

• Some of our export businesses want the rail line opened: this had been promised by Labour, the Greens and NZ First.

• We want a first-class education system and funding for organisations that are rehabilitating people with no work.

• We want a full complement of police in our region as some positions on the East Coast need to be filled.

• We want common-sense policies that will allow jobs to flourish in our region and not be tied up with red tape.

MAYOR GARRY HOWARD

Buller District Council

We would like to see any incoming government continue to support the Rural Broadband Initiative (RBI) for the benefit of New Zealand. Central government has been proactive in establishing its RBI across rural schools and communities. Broadband is now an essential enabler for business opportunities, education and healthcare. The need for broadband now rates as high as basic infrastructure requirements such as water, sewage, roading and footpath facilities.

On the West Coast, the completion of the RBI in late 2015 will still see 1587 households receiving a broadband service of five megabytes per second or less. This causes real issues when people try to send attachments and it does not enable them to live the “IT with lifestyle” rural dream.

Rural businesses and communities throughout New Zealand require a broadband service of no less than 15Mb/ sec. This will enhance productivity, support a range of modern services and can reduce the necessity for centralised city living.

Like a number of other rural communities, the West Coast relies on a few key industries. And when market forces reduce an industry’s profitability and viability – such as coal and gold mining – we need to try to diversify our economy.

Rafts of ideas emerge that have various levels of potential. Small councils do not have the resources or ability to research to any great degree the viability of such ideas. It is not up to small councils to establish business. Council’s role is to ensure the infrastructure and

MAYOR ANNETTE MAIN community services are provided so people engaged with any new business can enjoy the attributes of a community.

Central government can assist with feasibility funding so ideas that are proven to be commercially viable can be promoted to aligned business and resourced immigrants.

An example for the Buller District Council is the planned closure of the Holcim cement plant at Cape Foulwind.

Based eight kilometres west of Westport, the plant currently provides work for 98 full-time-equivalent employees.

That has a big influence on the commercial wellbeing of Westport and finding an alternative industry is essential. The plant has many attributes and is part of 480 hectares of land. Council is placed in the awkward position of not owning the plant and therefore relies on the goodwill of Holcim to look at alternative utilisation.

Discussions with the Minister of Economic Development the Hon Steven Joyce on how we can possibly have assistance with feasibility studies for alternative industry have been encouraging. Providing assistance to prove viability will always be a capital risk.

But without such preliminary help it is very difficult to get any traction on the smorgasbord of “good ideas” that enviably comes to any local council mayor’s attention.

Difficulty so often brings opportunity.

And it is not for central government to give hand-outs but to assist rural initiatives as rural communities drive export earnings for New Zealand.

Wanganui District Council I’m pleased our region is to be the subject of a recently-announced plan to provide an economic growth study. However, it is critical that the incoming government commits to working in partnership with our region to implement a strategy which takes mutual advantage of the opportunities that will be identified.

While we know we have existing strengths in agribusiness, I’m confident the study will identify other growth potential that will assist us in meeting our goal, which sits right alongside the central government aim of doubling this country’s current productivity.

Only in a strong partnership between central and local government will that goal be achieved in the timeframe we need both for our own economic success in the regions and for New Zealand.

SEPTEMBER 2014 LOCAL GOVERNMENT MAGAZINE

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ELECTION SPECIAL

MAYOR BRYAN CADOGAN Clutha District Council

OUR REGIONS’ ROADS LGNZ’s election manifesto calls for local and central government to work together to develop effective infrastructure development and funding policies. When it comes to transport, it asks an incoming central government to ensure the government policy statement – and the overall allocation of road and transport funding – recognise the value of local and regional roads to the country’s economic wellbeing and the sustainability of road funding for regions.

Local Government Magazine asked mayors what specific outcomes the local government sector as a whole should be seeking. What difference would those outcomes make to local communities?

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Transport is of obvious concern to our council. We have expressed our concerns on numerous occasions with no obvious effect on the overall outcome. It appears as though the greater underlying agenda will see our district’s needs sacrificed in order to acquire the national objective.

This leaves the Clutha District in the invidious position of having no alternatives other than to see substantial erosion of services, or ongoing increases in rates with no additional benefit to our district.

As a politician, it concerns me that the ramifications are beyond our control but we will bear the brunt as the perceived deliverer of services.

Affordability, and more specifically rating affordability, is increasingly becoming the number one issue for our district and in the coming years this situation will be markedly exacerbated by central government’s decision around this.

While I acknowledge that the majority of the costs in our district will be carried by our rural rating – which has had some relief in recent years – inadvertently, the urban rates will also be affected and the net consequence will unavoidably see further rates increases in all areas and mounting pressure on already stretched family and business budgets.

We are constantly being told the ‘pie’ will remain the same: ‘it’s just how it will be sliced up in the future that will change’. But even if we were to accept that, the recent ‘lolly scramble’ of additional money on the State Highway network – without obvious criteria

around allocation – was hard to understand. And, once again, we saw no benefit to our district.

This process is ongoing as we now head into the One Network Roading Classification which has the real potential to have an even bigger impact. We still do not know the actual scale of costs. But if this ends as badly for us as the Funding Assistance Rates (FAR) review then it will be a major catalyst to long-term economic and social decline.

Interestingly, the two drivers to rate increases in the Clutha District in recent years have been implementing central government requirements and our own discretionary projects. We have curtailed our discretionary projects to the point that many of our communities would perceive that we are not filling their requirements and expectations.

But the increase in central government’s demands sees our rates expected to increase by over four percent year-in year-out over our 10-year plan. This is substantially greater than all but a small sector of our community will be able to keep pace with.

I recently undertook a desktop study that shows rates in the Clutha District have increased at five times the pace of pensioners’ incomes over the past 15 years and over 20 times our biggest employers’ wage increases.

This is an unsustainable situation that will have both social and economic ramifications. I do not believe that any government would knowingly wish for these trends to continue. But their actions are entrenching the situation and ensuring individual hardship and collective social upheaval.

MAYOR JOHN CARTER Far North District Council The recent July storm really exposed the weaknesses in the current national roading strategy and how it is weighted against the regions. Routes which are vital to the local economy simply don’t meet the national funding criteria. With the Far North on a geographic limb, there has to be greater support given to transport infrastructure and in particular roads. Generations of under-investment in roads and infrastructure such as water and wastewater has reached critical proportions. Without the strength in the rating base enjoyed by more urban areas, our district has a huge mountain to climb. A large proportion of the damage caused by the storm was as a result of years of under-investment in the network. Arterial links have been hammered by the heavy transport industries, particularly logging.

A point was reached during the storm when the whole district was virtually isolated by a single slip on State Highway 1, simply because alternate routes could not sustain the increased traffic pressure. Raising rates is hardly an option when the Far North is already one of the highest rated areas in New Zealand.

The crux of the matter is that we have one of the longest roading networks in the country, a dispersed population and spread-out infrastructure (17 wastewater schemes and eight water supplies). We also face intense pressure from the visitor industry to provide high-value facilities, and have a small rating base and thousands of hectares of land which are not rateable or from which we have difficulties collecting rates (such as MaÂŻori freehold land). LG

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SEPTEMBER 2014 LOCAL GOVERNMENT MAGAZINE

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ELECTION SPECIAL

MESSAGE TO CENTRAL

Two industry associations put their wishlists to an incoming government.

We asked the NZ Council for Infrastructure Development and IPWEA NZ to tell us what they would like an incoming government to do. What would make a material and positive difference to the way their organisation and its members could operate for the greater good of New Zealand as a whole?

STEPHEN SELWOOD Chief executive, NZ Council for Infrastructure Development We don’t have a formal election manifesto. But, foremost, we’d like to see a very clear enunciation of the national infrastructure plan where there is strong alignment between what central, regional and local government are seeking to achieve. There needs to be a strong focus on infrastructure to support growing regions in a national economy and an investment programme that supports regional social and economic development.

New Zealand is in catch-up mode: particularly in growing cities like Auckland but also in the rebuild of Christchurch. We would like more clarity on what Christchurch’s future may look like. To what extent are we just restoring what we had or are we building a city for the future? We know what the blueprint is. But what is it actually seeking to achieve in terms of Christchurch’s role in the future of Canterbury, the South Island and New Zealand?

Our next priority is to see a Royal Commission established to investigate the best governance structure for local government in New Zealand. We need more discussion on whether or not there should be council amalgamations and, if so, what they might look like.

These conversations are already being had but they’re very much driven by local perspectives on a very piecemeal regionby-region basis. There’s a significant risk that we’ll end up with piecemeal outcomes based on the political sentiment within a region on the day.

We advocate for a much more holistic view from a NZ Inc perspective which asks what the right form of governance could be that will help lift regional economic potential. What is the right governance structure that enables that to be achieved whilst retaining – and arguably even strengthening – the opportunity for communities to have their voice and say?

We link two other important issues to these points. First, the current LGNZ-led discussion on funding makes it clear that local government’s ability to fund investment in infrastructure and

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various other services is under considerable pressure.

That’s most evident in Auckland’s $10-15 billion funding gap for investment in transport infrastructure. But it applies right the way through to smaller districts with declining populations and shrinking workforces who are struggling to provide basic core services.

The second point is that three significant laws that support local government activity need to be rethought and realigned with each other.

The Local Government Act, the Resource Management Act and the Land Transport Management Act contain conflicting objectives, duplicate processes and do not adequately address the need to lift regional social and economic development from a NZ Inc perspective.

We are calling for a Royal Commission to consider what may be the right governance structure for local government in New Zealand; which planning laws should support that structure; whether or not the existing troika of laws works to the best advantage; and what is the right means of funding.

We suggest the Royal Commission should be appointed in 2015. It should report back to parliament in 2017 prior to the next central government election so that the incoming government in 2017/18 can hopefully implement the recommendations. That provides a three-year discussion timeframe for much more rational, sensible and objective debate. We need to move away from the political pressure-cooked environment in which discussions are currently being held.

SAMANTHA GAIN Board member, IPWEA NZ The New Zealand division of the Institute of Public Works Engineering Australasia (IPWEA NZ) supports two areas of the LGNZ election manifesto in particular. These relate to addressing regional development across all of New Zealand and leading effective infrastructure development and funding policies.

There needs to be an increased focus on the regions. And central government’s infrastructure investment decisions need to recognise the role provincial infrastructure plays in driving New Zealand’s export economy. In the face of static and declining populations, the ability of rural and provincial local government to fund the required infrastructure upgrades and renewals, using current funding mechanisms, is variable at best.

Both central and local government need to make evidencebased investment decisions. There is a need to gather the evidence in a consistent way. This will better enable funds to be targeted for the greatest effect.

Water remains a key area of discussion. Although significant work has been undertaken in relation to water usage and allocation, more work needs to be done. In particular, the view that universal water metering is a silver bullet which will resolve all issues in that sector needs to be addressed. In the water services area in particular, the regulatory regime in New Zealand is fragmented and often poorly understood by customers and decision-makers. There needs to be a review … and consideration given to an integrating act.

Some focus should be given to bringing larger teams together, whether across or within organisations, in order to achieve economies of scale and consistency in asset management and procurement practices.

IPWEA NZ supports the introduction of 30-year infrastructure strategies into the local government planning framework, and will continue to support its members and the local government community in the ongoing development of those strategies.

Infrastructure strategies have the potential to provide the connection between the asset management and financial management functions of local government organisations.

We would also encourange central government organisations to adopt this discipline.

The National Infrastructure Unit (NIU) of the Treasury is providing a cross-sector focus on infrastructure matters, particularly in relation to the work on the National Infrastructure Plan, the infrastructure evidence base, and the “better business cases” model.

IPWEA NZ values its ongoing engagement with the NIU and will continue to foster this and other important relationships. LG

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SEPTEMBER 2014 LOCAL GOVERNMENT MAGAZINE

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MY VIEW

BLAIR KING

On reflecting your community’s values Blair King’s practical farming background drives his innovative approach to managing Tararua District Council, writes Ruth Le Pla.

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M

y plans to interview Blair King went from bad to bonkers really fast. It wasn’t his fault. We’d arranged to meet in the nice quiet Koru Lounge at Auckland Airport as he headed out of town. Unfortunately, I hadn’t quite twigged I’d need to actually be flying somewhere to be able to join him there. And despite my years of practice at authoritative bluffing, cajoling and shameless pleading there was no way the security guard was letting me through that departure gate.

Which is how I ended up talking with Tararua District Council chief executive Blair King in a rowdy public cafe, by the whoosh-suck-bang of the coffee machine, under the loudspeaker, next to a family sing-along-plus-guitar.

So my favourite bits of our conversation are... councils need to be authentic... bing bong... arbitrary shriek of laughter... we ask that you make your way to the check-in counters... most people pick up very quickly if something’s not accurate... all passengers for... people know when something’s not right... twang twang strum.

All of which provides a lovely insight into a man known for his quiet pragmatism and logical innovation.

King’s pragmatism shouldn’t come as a shock. He’s a farmer by background and an engineer by training. He looked a bit surprised when I guessed the engineering bit but, given his phlegmatic response to the circumstances and the general thread of our conversation, it wasn’t such a wild stab in the dark.

He tells me Tararua District Council likes to fly below the radar. How the council talks about itself – or more to the point, doesn’t talk about itself − is a reflection of the area’s largely rural population and their traditional values, he says.

These values sound very akin to King’s own background and belief in just getting on with his job without too much belly-aching.

“A number of councils around the country want to be front and foremost in people’s minds,” he says. “But you can rate a good farm by just driving past and seeing that the stock look well fed, the pasture looks great and the infrastructure looks really good.

Farmers don’t go into town, get on a soapbox and promote the fact that tomorrow they’ll be doing the silage.”

In council terms, this means Tararua District Council likes to provide relevant services and keep out of the headlines. Or as King says, “If we are upgrading wastewater we don’t go out and promote the fact we’re doing it.”

This kind of begs the question as to why he’s talking with me. In fairness, when I first approached King he immediately told me there were plenty of other “more interesting” people with “better profiles” around. “I just have a different view to some other people.”

King and Tararua District Council mayor Roly Ellis have built a reputation for innovation even though King reckons that’s strange “because a lot of the stuff we’re doing is actually not new”.

SEPTEMBER 2014 LOCAL GOVERNMENT MAGAZINE

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MY VIEW “These values sound very akin to King’s own background and belief in just getting on with his job without too much belly-aching.”

BEING BLAIR KING Chief Executive, Tararua District Council 2008 – Present

General Manager, Lakes Engineering Ltd 2007 – 2008

“I just have a different view to some other people.”

Assets Manager, Kaipara District Council 2002 – 2007

Prior employment includes: • Land Transport Safety Authority • Manukau City Council • Transfield Services • Ministry of Transport

“When people are treated as equals they’re quite happy contributing their ideas and working together.”

“I look at some of the processes that we tend to use in local government and we often make things really difficult.”

“When local and central agencies get on the same page they can form mighty strong and productive partnerships.”

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A case in point is the council’s early-stage conversations and genuine consultation with people who are experts in their various fields.

Once council decides to initiate a project it gets talking with contractors, landowners, geotechnical experts and all manner of other specialist and interested parties to see what they would do. King says the key lies in everyone understanding their input is valued, no matter how many or few letters they may have after their name.

“When people are treated as equals they’re quite happy contributing their ideas and working together,” he says.

“But when you treat someone as though you’re the master and they’re the servant you won’t get anybody bringing stuff to the table. They take the approach that they’re only likely to get blamed for any decisions.”

Such candid conversations help council embrace simple practical ideas such as project designers uploading their specifications into the electronics that control the diggers, graders and other machines on site, thereby eliminating the need for “dumb gear” layouts with pegs and strings.

“That way, we’ve now got somebody

working there who knows exactly how far to cut and exactly how much material they’ve shifted,” says King.

Earlier this year, this kind of smart and consultative approach resulted in council sorting a $60 million alliancestyle corridor network maintenance agreement − and selecting Downer as its preferred partner − in just eight weeks. That included full consultation, full evaluation: the lot.

“People say it’s innovative because everybody’s used to this really long process,” says King. “I look at some of the processes that we tend to use in local government and we often make things really difficult.”

Heaped on top of the problems created by such long and difficult processes, King says many local authorities are often hamstrung by distrust between themselves and some central government agencies.

The situation, King says, seems both “unusual” to those outside the parties concerned and proves “unproductive” to those inside them.

He reckons much of the problem boils down to egos. It’s about “people putting a stake in the ground, standing behind it and making other people

ONE BIG

IDEA IN

6

SOUNDBITES 1 “Local government needs to put

some of their best and brightest people into central government and related agencies. And we need to second people back.”

2 “The only way people understand

another organisation’s business is to embed themselves and find out.”

3 “Local government does second-

ments between its own organisations. We do secondments overseas.

But we do very few secondments into, and out of, central government.”

4 “That creates distrust. It creates the thinking that one person’s business or role is more important than another person’s.”

5 “When we operate that way

nothing gets achieved. We just fire broadsides at each other.”

6 “Why isn’t it happening? Because people put barriers in the way.”

negotiate by coming to them”. All of which ensures initiatives can degenerate into win-lose situations pretty fast.

Still, he asserts that when local and central agencies do get on the same page they can form mighty strong and productive partnerships.

The Ministry of Civil Defence and Emergency Management is a case in point, he says, as are New Zealand Police and the Ministry for the Environment.

He suggests more secondments between local and central government agencies may help resolve this issue in the longer term as person-byperson, organisation-by-organisation everyone gets to understand everyone else’s roles a bit better. (See box story “One big idea in 6 soundbites”.)

Such measures may also help cut through the huge amounts of consultation that elongate processes and drive everyone bonkers.

“It’s exactly the same as you meeting me here,” says King. “People get to know each other and they know when something’s not quite right. So if you’re working with someone who now sees that their ability to progress something is linked to a partnership, suddenly

both parties are really keen to get it sorted.”

King learnt some of this partnership stuff first-hand when as a young guy working for the Ministry of Transport he had to work alongside gruff old police officers.

He worked out pretty fast that the way to even start to win their respect was to go out on patrol with them to see first-hand what they had to deal with.

Now, as chief executive, he uses what he calls “considered judgement” to help people reporting direct to him at Tararua District Council trust their own gut instinct and initiative, and feel comfortable making good, firm and fast decisions. They, in turn, trust those reporting direct to them and the trust and reliance cascades down through the organisation.

And, no, he won’t have a bar of my idea that he can only do some of this lovely consultative stuff because Tararua, with just over 10,000 ratepayers and around 17,500 residents, is a small council.

“A farm can go from milking 200 cows to milking 1000,” he tells me.

“And the same principles apply with councils.”

And with that, he’s off. LG

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ATEED

INTEGRATION ROCKS

How to smash silos and drive economic growth For the past two years Auckland Tourism Events & Economic Development (ATEED) boss Brett O’Riley has been dismantling legacy structures and getting staff to spot much broader opportunities. He shares his story with Ruth Le Pla.

“Nothing gives me more satisfaction than when one of our team comes to me with an opportunity where the benefits are across the whole business.”

“Once people can see there’s an opportunity for their ideas to be heard, it’s amazing what comes out of the woodwork.”

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F

rom chiropractors’ conventions to super-yacht makeovers, ATEED’s 190-or-so people are out trawling for ideas on how to help Auckland’s economy grow. They’re the connectors − the synapses that help spark ideas, build and champion other people’s dreams or simply get the right people together in the right room at the right time. And so far, they’re making a pretty good fist of it.

This year’s Dick Smith NRL Auckland Nines event alone added $9.35 million to Auckland’s GDP with a cool $3.24 million of this plunging straight into New Zealand’s economic coffers from offshore. The initiative, which LGNZ shortlisted in its inaugural EXCELLENCE Awards in July, drew 16,000 Kiwis and a further 6000 Aussies-with-wallets to the city, according to independent researchers Fresh Info Co. Most impressively, a plan to attract $4 million worth of high-value super-yacht tourists to Auckland has burgeoned into $29 million worth of incremental GDP from refitting, repairing and generally super-sprucing up their super-yachts.

Such examples, and many more, are the bottom-line benefits of an approach that Brett O’Riley has been championing ever since he first walked through the Auckland Council Controlled Organisation’s door as its new CEO back in May 2012.

“Nothing gives me more satisfaction,” he says, “than when one of our team comes to me with an opportunity where the benefits are across the whole business.”

O’Riley took up his new role some 18 months after ATEED had been created as part of the Auckland City amalgamation. Yet the organisation still carried considerable baggage from having been formed from some 17 different groups from the eight merged councils.

As O’Riley puts it, he found “a very siloed approach”.

He’s been rolling out initiatives to help change mindsets ever since: all designed to help staff develop an awareness of how their work can leverage other opportunities.

“Our name underscores the fact that we were working in silos,” he says.

“We say we’re involved in tourism,

The University of Auckland hosts the International Association for Physical Education in Higher Education (AIESEP) World Congress 2014.

IMAGE: KIRSTY HARKNESS, TIGERTIGER PHOTOGRAPHY

events and economic development.

So right from the start I said we’re not an economic development agency, a regional tourism organisation or an events organisation. We’re an economic growth agency.”

His thinking? First, he wanted to emphasise ATEED was from now on different and power would now come from working in an integrated way across the whole organisation and with its partners.

“That stopped me from picking favourites or being thought to be doing that.”

Second, O’Riley was signalling that the agency’s single most important focus would from now on be on outcomes − which are about growth – and not on outputs.

“I wanted there to be no

ambiguity,” he says. “My criticism of the public sector is that we’re way too output-focused and not outcomefocused. And the problem with that is if you want to engage with the business community, they focus on outcomes.”

In practical terms, ATEED has given its processes and culture a great big shake-up.

ATEED now uses kotahitanga − a traditional Ma¯ori principle around partnering − as its guiding philosophy to create unity of purpose and oneness rather than the westernised contractual view of partnership.

The organisation has been restructured to get more alignment around some of its key focus areas and to break up some of the old emphasis on people working variously

CHECKLIST FOR SMASHING SILOS

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Develop awareness of how one piece of work can leverage other opportunities.

Create a new shared goal.

Build in speed and flexibility.

Use a rolling 90-day plan.

Focus on outcomes not outputs. nable people at all levels of E your organisation to be leaders.

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Favour kotahitanga principles of partnering, one-ness and unity of purpose over the westernised contractual view of partnership.

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Share your ideas with your own staff and business partners.

LET’S TALK

Leadership students shadow ATEED CEO Brett O’Riley to see for themselves how his philosophy of integration is applied.

Are you trying to improve the way different parts of your local government organisation work together? Auckland Tourism Events & Economic Development (ATEED) chief executive Brett O’Riley says he’s happy to pool ideas.

“Integration is powerful. We happen to work across tourism, events and economic development. Maybe you work with arts and culture, or community or facilities.

“Every organisation is different. But the more you can try and sensibly get an organisation functioning from an integrated perspective, the greater the outcomes that you get.”

If you’d like to talk with Brett contact him direct on Brett.ORiley@aucklandnz.com or DDI: +64 9 365 0567.

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ATEED

90 DAYS & COUNTING Every 90 days Auckland Tourism Events and Economic Development (ATEED) re-prioritises its business.

Sounds complicated? Well, yes it is but the benefit far outweighs the complexity, according to chief executive Brett O’Riley.

Under ATEED’s rolling 90-day plan a group of representatives from across the business reviews every new project. Their task? To check whether each piece of work is getting the maximum outcome from dollars invested across the business.

“When I first started here it was more like, ‘here’s your annual plan, here’s your money, off you go’,” says O’Riley.

Now, he says, the 90-day system creates an environment of fast failure.

“We don’t start something and just keep it going and going. Regular reviews encourage people to prioritise and to think laterally about the outcomes they will get out of projects.”

O’Riley also says he initially had very little visibility across the whole business. “But I could take you into my office now, log into the system and you could see across every one of our projects.”

Some basic dashboard information is now on ATEED’s website. www.businessaucklandnz.com Expect that to grow as ATEED keeps working on its goal to make it easier for people outside the organisation to more easily see what it’s doing.

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on tourism, events or economic development but not across all three.

There’s now little focus on individual sectors and a constant search for the big-picture interventions that drive the best outcomes.

ATEED’s people sit down with business on a regular basis to work out how they can partner commercially to get better results for the city as a whole.

And a rolling 90-day plan builds in a fleet-footed way to keep checking all these various priorities stay firmly on track. (See box story “90 days & counting”.)

Underpinning all this is ATEED’s kaiarahi programme in which a cohort of staff volunteers has been trained as facilitators and charged with asking every single other staff member to share their thoughts on ATEED’s collective values.

O’Riley says the initial four-month process shows the “real power” in enabling people at all levels to be leaders. “The nature of the public sector is top-down leadership. But in any organisation there are people with enormous leadership capability who are not in what you would normally view as leadership positions.”

Last year, he says, ATEED’s employee engagement score went from 64 to 78 percent, “which, to me, is a good sign of how much people are enjoying the environment”.

O’Riley says if he could turn back the clock he probably would have tried to do it all faster. “But, inevitably, in the public sector there

are a lot of processes that you have to follow... The local government environment is not always conducive to being moved along at pace.”

He’s mindful, too, that enabling many of the sweeping changes to be led from the ground up circumvented a few issues that ATEED may otherwise have had “around the speed at which things were moving”.

Ultimately, he says, ATEED’s power lies in having all the levers of economic growth under the one roof. “Instead of just doing an event or a tourism activity or an economic development intervention, we line them up and pull on more than one lever at one time.

That way, we get multiple outcomes out of the same initiative.”

And he challenges the view that Auckland and ATEED are only successful because they’ve got access to big dollops of cash. “We’re successful because we know how to maximise the outcomes from our budget. It’s got nothing to do with the overall investment level.

“There are other areas in New Zealand that probably spend more dollars per ratepayer on economic development than we do but we just make sure we get maximum bang for our buck.”

Now, he says, two and a half years since he started at ATEED, people from all parts of the organisation throw “phenomenal” ideas at him on a daily basis. “And if you create an environment where people are encouraged to do that, you get some fantastic thinking.” LG

NOT SO CONVENTIONAL? • In the 2012/13 financial year, Auckland Convention Bureau (ACB) – a division of ATEED – worked on bids to bring 36 conventions, conferences and incentive travel trips to Auckland. In 2013/14, with a focus on greater integration, ACB worked on 50 bids, which represents a 39 percent increase.

• In 2012/13, ACB bid for 14 conference / convention events for organisations based outside New Zealand and Australia, winning eight events with a combined value to regional GDP of $6.4 million.

• This rose to 22 bids in 2013/14 (a 57 percent increase on the previous year), with 12 wins to date (a 50 percent increase, with the results of one bid yet to be confirmed).

These have a combined $9.1 million value to regional GDP (42 percent increase).

• Lead opportunities, general enquiries, familiarisation visits and hosted site inspections have also risen significantly from 2012/13 to 2013/14.

COMMUNITY Community support is crucial to keeping our neighbourhoods safe from natural disasters, says Greater Wellington Regional Council manager flood protection Graeme Campbell.

WISING UP ON WATERWAYS Greater Wellington places community needs at the centre of its Hutt River flood protection project .

“While economics, policy and science are a critical part of flood protection project planning, equally important is the buy-in from the community.”

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egional councils around the country are shifting to the top of their agendas ways to futureproof their communities against natural disasters and climate change.

Along the way, they’re gaining a much better understanding of what it takes to protect neighbourhoods from the devastating effects of events like earthquakes and flooding.

The Canterbury earthquakes and last year’s tremors in Wellington served as wake-up calls for councils around the country with most – if not all – focusing effort and energy

into boosting the resilience of communities.

The fear of earthquakes is real for Wellingtonians. But severe flooding poses the greatest threat to the region with many neighbourhoods built on natural floodplains, reclaimed land and along the many waterways in the Greater Wellington region.

Greater Wellington Regional Council (GWRC) has been focusing on boosting overall resilience, and in particular flood protection, for more than a decade. (See box story “Focus on flood protection”.)

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COMMUNITY

“In the past, local and regional councils tended to look at issues like flood protection through an economic lens, often at the expense of the needs of a community, neighbourhood or the environment.”

COMMUNITY NEEDS Greater Wellington Regional Council is utilising the impressive force of neighbourhood support to ensure communities are not only being protected but also involved in the protection of their own homes.

By working together we boost the resilience of our region and ensure residents are able to keep enjoying our waterways.

While it sounds obvious that neighbourhoods and communities should have a stake in the decision-making process that affects them, putting that into practice is not always easy. It takes a lot of give and take and honest discussions about what the needs of a community truly are.

As the devastating effects of climate change become more and more real, the need for vital flood protection measures is becoming more imminent. It is important that communities are involved and that councils are able to strike the right balance between scientific-based policy, economics and the needs of a community.

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THE COST OF DOING NOTHING The risks are clear, in both an economic and social sense. The economic impact of a severe flood along the Hutt River is high, with an estimated $1.6 billion cost for Hutt City. But the bigger toll is the human cost and the loss of homes, income and lives for the 100,000 people living on the floodplain and surrounding communities.

GWRC is currently upgrading flood protection along the Hutt River.

The Boulcott section was completed recently and planning has started for the Hutt City CBD section of the river.

This involves a lot of consultation with stakeholders and affected parties, and as most of us know, this isn’t an easy task.

People who live, work and play alongside rivers like the Hutt River are most at risk, but any protection work to minimise the damage and harm caused by flooding will inevitably impact on them the most. In some cases, the need to protect a community can see a need arise for land purchases, which is a delicate matter to deal with.

CHANGING THE WAY WE CONSULT In the past, local and regional councils tended to look at issues like flood protection through an economic lens, often at the expense of the needs of

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a community, neighbourhood or the environment.

Consultation is a statutory requirement that can often be cumbersome and unproductive as both sides of the issues talk at − rather than with − each other. Hearings often offer little engagement between the two sides and result in a project being resented by the community it is looking to protect.

And while this approach may protect people from issues like rising waters and climate change, it can leave a bad taste in the mouths of communities and result in an unwillingness to compromise.

After embarking on multiple flood protection projects, GWRC has recognised the need for change.

While economics, policy and science are a critical part of flood protection project planning, equally important is the buy-in from the community and the ability to work alongside them to make decisions that will not only protect them from severe flooding, but also add to the dynamic of their neighbourhood.

THE BOULCOTT PROJECT It was with this approach in mind that the flood protection team embarked on its planning to increase protection infrastructure along Lower Hutt’s Boulcott area, a particularly vulnerable section of the river with low-lying golf courses on one side and

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houses on the other.

The area has flooded twice in recent history – in 1998 causing extensive damage to infrastructure and destroying the Akatarawa Bridge – and again in 2005, sparking the need for an upgrade for infrastructure.

Modelling showed that in order to protect the surrounding residents, and communities further down the river, we would need to possibly take up a substantial amount of land from the golf courses and cause a lot of disruption to people living on the residential side, as the stopbanks needed to be located far enough away from the river to provide a lasting and sustainable solution.

WORKING TOGETHER After talking to the community and understanding their concerns, we discovered ways to work with them to not only protect them from the river, but to also beautify and add to the functionality of the neighbourhood.

To minimise the impact on the golf courses, we hired a golf course architect, who worked with us and the affected clubs to redesign the courses, taking into account new land that we had opened up to allow them to use.

We also negotiated with the clubs to allow us to take trucks through the land to bring materials in and out during the build process – minimising the disruption to surrounding residents who adamantly told us they didn’t

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want the 1400 truck and trailer loads needed to complete the project running through their neighbourhood.

The community had its list of demands, and one by one we worked alongside them to ensure that their needs were being met, and ensuring that they were playing an active role in making decisions for their neighbourhoods.

Not only did the entire project come in on budget and ahead of time, but we were also able to leave the Boulcott residents with a cycleway on the stopbank by paving it to create a link between the neighbourhood and the local school to the extensive Hutt River Trail network, and installing a sense of ownership by inviting members of the community to help plant trees along it. LG

1. GWRC hired a golf course architect to help re-design the neighbouring golf courses. Here, some features of the golf club are being relocated to ensure the course can continue to be used alongside the stopbanks.

2. Contractors work on placing and compaction of earth fill for the stopbanks.

3. The concrete retaining wall for the stopbank takes shape.

4. While constructing the stopbanks, GWRC also worked with Hutt City Council to upgrade storm water pipes in the area.

5. In a joint project with Hutt City Council, a cycle and walk track was constructed on top of the stopbank to build linkages within the community.

FOCUS ON FLOOD PROTECTION At Greater Wellington Regional Council a team of engineers, scientists, researchers and modellers has been working to ensure communities are aware of the potentially disastrous impacts from rising waters, and protection measures put in place.

The team has been working with territorial authorities, interest groups, iwi and communities throughout the region to find solutions to the potential impacts of flooding. This has been especially

true for the Hutt River, which has a significant flood risk due to development and intensive land use effectively determining the river’s path.

The effort to protect Hutt City from the river began in the late 1800s, with stopbanks being constructed. These were upgraded in the 1960s and while they are high enough to cope with a one in 100 year flood, testing has shown they could fail before reaching this capacity due to structural weakness.

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2014 LGNZ CONFERENCE

COLLECTIVE CLOUT As New Zealand heads into the general election, this year’s LGNZ conference highlights how the whole country benefits from powering local economies and building vibrant communities.

Over 550 local government delegates got together in Nelson recently for master class sessions and presentations on the sector’s most significant issues and opportunities.

DRIVING REGIONAL GROWTH LGNZ president Lawrence Yule says the future of provincial New Zealand is a top priority for local government over the next three years. “LGNZ wants regional New Zealand to be as confident about its future as our cities are about theirs,” he says in his opening speech at the organisation’s conference.

Yule warns that clouds are gathering over the future of provincial New Zealand and calls for a shared approach to ensuring growth right across the whole country. Jobs and essential services will be stretched in the regions, he says, and population changes will add financial pressures on local authorities.

“This is at odds with what our provinces contribute to the national economy. So it’s absolutely vital we find a solution to this conundrum.”

He says LGNZ represents all communities and recognises that economic growth should occur across cities, regions and provincial New Zealand alike.

“A shared approach to ensuring the maintenance of the infrastructure that supports the economic engine of New Zealand will be essential.”

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WIFI? WHY NOT? Xero chief executive Rod Drury calls on small towns to start building their digital brands. He encourages councils and businesses to work together to lift regional economies. “Businesses are generally pretty eager to help.”

One suggestion: make WiFi connectivity available as soon as people arrive at a local airport.

Making regions attractive for business is a key priority for local government as the country faces uneven economic growth, with some regions growing faster than others.

MIND THE GAP Leading economist Shamubeel Eaqub says economic wealth is unevenly shared in New Zealand, and warns that gaps in economic outcomes and opportunity will get wider unless current policies change.

Eaqub, principal economist at the New Zealand Institute of Economic Research (NZIER), says “secular and unstoppable forces” including technology, urbanisation, globalisation and ageing are marginalising many regions.

“Current policies are not working. It is an uncomfortable reality but it is not without hope. It cannot be a conversation of envy about Auckland and the rest, rural and urban, environment and economy.”

He calls for place-aware policies saying each region will be different and unique so the same policy for all is not going to work.

LGNZ is launching a series of roadshows over coming months to explore how local government can enable and support economic growth across the whole country.

UPPING THE GAME Speakers from the private sector, iwi and local government highlight the need to lift governance and financial performance. Craig Stobo, chair of the Local Government Funding Agency and AIG, says it’s important to have a majority of independent directors with diversity of location and skills, and that all conflicts of interest are declared.

“Directors need to understand their roles for good governance, to know when to pull back and to entrust their management, seeking results while ensuring regular reporting. It is also important to adapt to change.”

Arihia Bennett, chief executive officer of Te Ru¯nanga o Ng¯ai Tahu, says a governance change in 2011 introduced two new senior committees – for external and internal communications – which allow directors to be more deeply engaged with tribal matters and refocus efforts.

“Governance requires specific generic competencies such as those the Institute of Directors promotes, and for us it is important we include tribal nuances and significant cultural leader practices.”

Auckland Council chief financial officer Andrew McKenzie says the council’s reporting frameworks mean councillors get a monthly performancefocused report on what’s happening across the whole organisation.

“We set up a concept of executive governance so that if you work as a leader in Auckland Council at any tier, you have to take responsibility for performance across the whole of council.”

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2014 LGNZ CONFERENCE NEW TASKFORCE TO TACKLE LOCAL RULES

“Local government isn’t just about pipes and concrete, bridges and roads. True local government is mostly about our people.”

Bonita Bigham Te Maruata representative

Prime Minister John Key announces Local Government Minister Paula Bennett will set up a Rules Reduction Taskforce. This joint central and local government review group will look at ways to reduce and improve local regulation.

The taskforce, which will also include people from local communities, is part of the government’s response to the Productivity Commission’s “Towards Better Local Regulation” report.

Key acknowledges many property owners are frustrated with current regulatory requirements, and the time and money it takes to complete transactions.

“When local government sets requirements for building standards, for example, they can increase the cost of building, which affects house price inflation and potentially the track for interest rates and the exchange rate.”

He says central government grapples with regulatory issues as well, and suggests local and central government work together to make life easier for ratepayers.

LABOUR ANNOUNCES FUND Opposition leader David Cunliffe announces Labour’s new policy on regional development. It includes a $200 million fund for projects that bring community-wide benefits and generate jobs in regions across the country. The money will be released over four years.

An independent panel of experts including local government, business and iwi will manage the fund.

The projects must complement private sector investment.

Cunliffe says it’s critical to unlock the economic potential of the regions so that the wider New Zealand economy can prosper. “We understand every region is different and has its own strengths. We don’t believe in one size fits all.”

CUT THE ISOLATION Two leading economic thinkers say councils need to get to grips with what New Zealand’s future economic landscape could mean for local development. BERL’s Dr Ganesh Nana and Lincoln University’s professor Caroline Saunders say councils need to understand the bigger picture as they develop their 2015-25 long-term plans and infrastructure strategies.

Saunders says the strengths of regions are important to regional development. “We need to think about value-added activities and what regions are good at, what they’re passionate about, and how to assess how that fits with the global environment and economy.”

BERL chief economist Nana says New Zealand needs to think about its vision for the next 20, 30 and 40 years. “We need to move past this idea of ‘Auckland versus the regions’.

We need to think about where market services, business services, manufacturing services and primary services are located and work together, because regions cannot exist in isolation.”

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THREE REMITS

1 LGNZ members vote overwhelmingly in favour of the association

advocating to government on key steps to help owners strengthen their earthquake-prone buildings. These include introducing financial incentives and tools to help owners meet insurance costs.

2 Members give the green light for LGNZ to ask government to amend

legislation so the Director-General of Health, rather than local authorities, decides on adding fluoride to drinking water supplies.

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They also ask LGNZ to form a new policy position on legislation and process governing the reorganisation of local authorities. Key points: • No reorganisation can occur against the wishes of a majority of potential voters; • Independent expert evidence is required to demonstrate any amalgamation proposal has benefits that substantially exceed the costs; and • All current and potential amalgamation proposals are postponed until legislative amendment occurs.

LOUD & CLEAR LGNZ launches its election manifesto outlining policy positions to help create stronger communities and economic growth across all of New Zealand. LGNZ president Lawrence Yule says the proposed measures are intended to “grow LGNZ’s constructive relationship with central government and create a legislative, regulatory and policy environment that enables councils to make a difference in their communities and local economies”. See article on page 14 of this issue for more on the manifesto.

WHAT MAYORS & CHAIRS THINK A new Simpson Grierson / LGNZ report reveals the main concerns of mayors and chairs of local authorities. Key findings in “Taking the pulse of local government in New Zealand” include: · 84% say economic growth and job creation are by far the most important concerns for mayors and chairs; · 46% are concerned with environmental impact and sustainability; · 40% are concerned with rates affordability; · Over 66% say funding limitations and the consistency of central government policy-making are seen as major impediments in community outcomes; and · 84% say housing affordability is not an issue best solved by local government alone.

The survey, carried out in June, drew responses from mayors and chairs of 62 rural, provincial, metropolitan and regional councils.

Go to the Simpson Grierson website for a copy of the report. www.simpsongrierson.com/taking-the-pulse-of-local-government/ LG

“Good cities react to opportunities when they arise.

Great cities plan and create opportunities.”

Paul Pisasale mayor of Ipswich

“In New Zealand we often create policies and then don’t review, test and refine them.”

Shamubeel Eaqub principal economist, NZIER

“Regions can’t exist in isolation, just as cities can’t.”

Ganesh Nana chief economist, BERL

“Florence’s renaissance wasn’t sparked by a scintillating long-term plan.”

Kobus Mentz director, Urbanismplus

“There’s no such thing as standing still in local government right now. If you’re not moving forward you’re moving backwards.”

David Hammond chief executive, Thames-Coromandel District Council

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AWARDS

WINNERS WINNERS WINNERS

The best engineering, environmental, construction, maintenance & community projects in the land.

IPENZ Auckland Branch Arthur Mead Awards

La Rosa Stream Daylighting Project Restoring the Health of Kawakawa Bay

SMALL PROJECTS CATEGORY MERIT AWARD: The La Rosa Stream Daylighting Project Auckland Council; HEB Construction; Boffa Miskell; Engineering Design Consultants

LARGE PROJECTS CATEGORY MERIT AWARD: Restoring the Health of Kawakawa Bay Project Harrison Grierson; Watercare Services; Fulton Hogan.

MERIT AWARD: The Tui Mine Remediation Project URS New Zealand; Waikato Regional Council. The judges also acknowledge the contributions of AECOM, Pattle Delamore, Tonkin & Taylor, McConnell Dowell and Hiway Environmental.

MERIT AWARD: The ASB North Wharf Project Fletcher Construction; Babbage Consultants; ASB Bank; Kiwi Income Property Trust.

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Auckland Council’s project to revitalise a West Auckland stream catchment wins a major engineering accolade from the Institute of Professional Engineers of New Zealand (IPENZ). The La Rosa Gardens Reserve stream daylighting project liberated 180 metres of the Fairburn and Parahiku streams from underground pipes, restoring them to a more natural state.

Removing the pipes improves the waterways’ ability to sustain life and their performance as part of the local stormwater drainage network. New walkways and public artworks in the reserve have created a place where the community can connect with the natural environment. The project team also worked with the local community and held a series of planting days and community events.

Australasian engineering and design consultancy Harrison Grierson wins an IPENZ environment and sustainability award for its work on an innovative $22 million sewerage scheme at Auckland’s Kawakawa Bay. Implemented by Watercare Services, the project counters chronic pollution in the bay’s four kilometre foreshore caused by failing septic tanks. The pollution had led to prohibitions on swimming and shellfish gathering, and a moratorium on further development. The Harrison Griersondesigned scheme included New Zealand’s first application of a vacuum sewage system and a biological nutrient removal sewage treatment plant using ultrafiltration to ensure sewage was treated to world-class standards.

Emily Stevens

Association of Consulting Engineers (ACENZ) INNOVATE NZ Awards Opus International Consultants’ Emily Stevens wins the ACENZ Future Leader Award. She is recognised for her strong skills in leading teams who work in high-risk situations following slip and rockfall events on the state highways. Stevens, a chartered geotechnical engineer from Queenstown, specialises in geotechnical site investigation and design, contract management, and construction supervision.

Stevens chairs Opus’ Geotechnical Practice Interest Network, a role that oversees the technical wellbeing of 200 professionals worldwide. She is also the Central Otago representative for IPENZ and is particularly passionate about the development of women in leadership in engineering.

Opus also won a Silver Excellence Award for its SH94 Milford Road: Homer Tunnel Western Portal Rockfall Risk Management work and two Merit Awards for the SH35 Mareanui Realignment and Christchurch Southern Motorway Stage 1.

Downer NZ contract manager Bruce Marshall accepts the Excellence in Routine Maintenance Award for Downer’s work on its long-standing contract to provide water and wastewater service for Horowhenua District Council.

Hirepool Construction Excellence Awards 2014 CATEGORY ONE – less than $0.5m: Katikatibased Bridge It NZ, for a project to replace a 1940’s farm swing bridge over the Motu River.

CATEGORY TWO – $0.5m to $5m: McConnell Dowell Constructors for repair works on the historic Arapuni Power Station diversion gate and tunnel.

CATEGORY THREE – $5m to $30m: McConnell Dowell Constructors for the fish-hook design Lower Hatea River Crossing at Whangarei.

CATEGORY FOUR – greater than $30m: Fulton Hogan for the Christchurch Southern Motorway Stage 1.

ROAD SCIENCE was the winner of the Excellence in Maintenance and Management of Assets section for its work for NZTA in Waikato.

Gold awards also go to: Holmes Fire: for its work on the Auckland Art Gallery.

Beca: for mechanical services and artesian heating and cooling work at Christchurch International Airport; and another for its work on the Wairakei Bioreactor.

Aurecon: for its Haywards / Benmore HVDC pole 3 project.

Trustpower Far North Community Awards A public piano, a giant noughts and crosses game board and a ‘free little library’ book exchange in a phone booth are just part of an award-winning project by grassroots group Focus Paihia. The community group has recently taken out the supreme prize at the Trustpower Far North Community Awards for its work revamping and revitalising a Paihia waterfront car park.

The group has transformed the space on a lean budget with materials sourced from donations where possible or obtained at cost. Trustpower

community relations representative Jess Somerville says every layer of the project has been volunteer-driven and it’s incredible what can be achieved when people come together to take charge of their own community’s future.

“It has turned a formerly unloved car park into a hugely popular green space using a recipe that links hand and hearts in a united cause and has changed Paihia for the better,” she says. “You can see the pride right across the community in a cause well supported and a job well done.”

A group of local people set up Focus Paihia in 2010 to help their town blossom and thrive. They involve and facilitate the community’s ideas every step of the way.

Presenting the awards, Far North District Council mayor John Carter says there are hundreds of community and voluntary organisations doing great work right across the Far North District. Focus Paihia will now represent the Far North region at the Trustpower National Community Awards in March 2015. LG

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NEXT STEPS LG MAGAZINE • Which presentation or session at the recent LGNZ conference in Nelson did you personally learn the most from?

DUFFY • The presentation by City of Ipswich mayor Paul Pisasale.

What was the key message that you received from that particular presentation or session?

Be a real leader and trust yourself.

Brendan Duffy On becoming vice president of LGNZ Horowhenua District Council mayor Brendan Duffy has stepped up to become LGNZ’s new vice president after being voted in at the group’s 2014 annual general meeting in Nelson recently. Duffy, who succeeds Opotiki District Council mayor John Forbes, is known for his strong and constructive advocacy skills.

Horowhenua District Council CEO David Clapperton, who has worked with Duffy for almost nine years, says Duffy isn’t scared to tackle issues affecting the community, regardless of how difficult or unpopular those issues may be.

“Brendan works particularly well with the decision-makers within council and the community,” he says, “to ensure difficult decisions are made by making sure good information is available and all options are explored before considered decisions are made.”

A member of LGNZ’s 15-member national council, Duffy chairs the organisation’s provincial sector and represents the lower North Island’s zone three grouping of councils.

Duffy was elected Horowhenua District Council mayor in 2004, after serving nine years as a councillor.

Clapperton says Duffy is usually “going 100 miles an hour”. He adds that Duffy’s open door policy enables constituents, officials and Duffy’s team to discuss matters in a constructive, positive environment.

“He speaks the truth and from the heart. He’s passionate about this community and that is reflected in his commitment to doing anything he can to help make it a better place.”

Clapperton says Duffy has an ability to “move people from the status quo to a position that meets the challenges of the future”.

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What, if anything, will you change in your role as mayor of Horowhenua District Council as a result of things you may have learnt, or thought about, at the conference?

Be even more engaging with a wider range of community groups.

Who do you most admire, or draw inspiration from, in local government, and why?

It’s an outstanding body of dedicated people determined to make real differences to communities across this fantastic country.

My local government inspiration is from the collective minds, not just one individual.

Modesty aside, what qualities do you think you bring to your new role as LGNZ vice president?

I hope I can be seen to fairly reflect the issues of councils across New Zealand and to support the leadership in a measured and constructive manner.

When, sometime in the future, you eventually step down from a career in local government, what would you most like to be remembered for?

Providing opportunities for the community I represent to make a constructive difference to people’s lives.

Roading New Zealand and the New Zealand Contractors’ Federation have merged into Civil Contractors New Zealand – more to come

NEXT STEPS What are the key issues that you will address in your new role?

My priorities are to offer more flexible borrowing solutions to councils, increase the level of offshore investor participation in LGFA and bring some functions in-house.

Most importantly, I aim to keep building on the success of the past two and a half years.

What would you most like to be remembered for in your time as treasurer of Auckland Council?

Mark Butcher On joining the NZ Local Government Funding Agency Former Auckland Council treasurer Mark Butcher is the new chief executive at Local Government Funding Agency (LGFA) − New Zealand’s first and only semi-government issuer. He takes over from Phil Combes who has led the organisation since it was set up from scratch in late 2011. Combes, who is retiring, has described LGFA as one of the “great adventures” in New Zealand’s debt capital markets.

LG MAGAZINE • What attracted you to the role at LGFA? BUTCHER • LGFA has been immensely successful in its first two and a half years by providing councils with a new source of borrowing, lower borrowing costs and the ability to lengthen the term of their debt. LGFA has both raised $3.7 billion of debt on behalf of 42 councils and paid dividends to shareholders within the first 30 months.

Having been associated with LGFA since establishment I understand that the setup phase has now been completed and it is exciting to be part of the next phase of its journey.

I am most proud of my Auckland Council treasury team who we pulled together from the eight previous councils.

They’ve been recognised in the past year by INFINZ as the best treasury team in New Zealand and by Global Treasury News as the best treasury team globally. Right from the onset in November 2010 we wanted to achieve best practice and it is great to have been recognised globally for achieving that.

Who do you most admire, or draw inspiration from, in local government, and why?

I joined local government from the financial sector almost four years ago so until then I only had a narrow and limited interaction with the sector as a ratepayer. Over my time at Auckland Council my admiration has grown for the effort that elected officials put into their roles. An Auckland councillor works long hours, is remunerated far less relative to the responsibility and workload they undertake, and without any job security given that their positions are on the line every three years.

What is the local government sector’s most pressing need right now?

Local government as a whole needs to better convey to ratepayers, media and central government the role the sector plays in the economy and the positive contribution it makes.

I get frustrated with the constant kicking the sector gets from these stakeholders regarding misconceived views on debt levels, inefficiencies and obstacles to doing business when there are so many positives within the sector.

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SEPTEMBER 2014 LOCAL GOVERNMENT MAGAZINE

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NEXT STEPS

BRIAN WOOD LG MAGAZINE • What, in your opinion, are the most valuable skills, expertise or insights that you gained from your time as both chief executive of Southland District Council and CFO of Dunedin City Council?

WOOD • Knowledge of the processes that local government uses to fund and plan for infrastructure expenditure.

How will this help you in your new role as an independent director of Harrison Grierson?

Brian Wood & Elena Trout On becoming independent directors at Harrison Grierson Australasian engineering and design consultancy Harrison Grierson has appointed two experienced business leaders as independent directors. Chair Margaret Devlin says the board is excited about the new level of critical thinking and external experience that Brian Wood and Elena Trout bring into the company.

Wood is an independent director and consultant. He has held senior leadership roles in both the private and public sectors including Southland District Council and Dunedin City Council. His consulting roles have included a period with the International Monetary Fund.

Obviously my knowledge of local government will help in understanding the opportunities for Harrison Grierson to assist local government units to achieve their desired infrastructure outcomes. That knowledge, allied with my experience gained when I was managing director of MWH in New Zealand, will help Harrison Grierson in understanding how to take up those opportunities.

What are the key issues for senior leaders in local government right now?

Developing and maintaining infrastructure given the funding constraints that local government has to currently confront.

What one single change would bring the most significant benefit to local government?

Greater use of public private partnerships to fund and manage infrastructure.

ELENA TROUT LG MAGAZINE • What are some of the learnings from your background in implementing large-scale infrastructure developments – particularly in the energy and transport areas?

TROUT • It’s important to apply the framework of systems thinking to any development – that is bringing all professional disciplines together so you deliver a better and more sustainable asset and not just deliver an engineering solution.

How will this help inform your decision-making in your new role as an independent director with Harrison Grierson?

Provide guidance to Harrison Grierson in delivering fit-for-purpose professional services that recognise their wider impacts and assist in developing services to support a more diverse range of local government assets.

Trout is a professional engineer with extensive experience as a company director, project director and consultant. She has specialised in change management, asset management, contract procurement, and major project development and implementation of large-scale infrastructure developments particularly in the energy and transport areas.

Before their appointments, Devlin – who was recently appointed chair of WEL Networks – was the company’s sole independent director.

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What are Harrison Grierson’s long-term aims for working with New Zealand local authorities?

We aim to continue to grow our professional services to local government nationally and expand our service offering to other local government-owned infrastructure.

What one single change would most help ensure New Zealand has good quality infrastructure in the longer term?

Preparation and implementation of robust strategic asset management plans which are based on a consistent framework for that asset class together with taking a considered view of the infrastructure’s capital investment with the whole-of-life costs. LG

JEREMY ELWOOD / ON THE FUNNY STUFF COM E DIAN, ACTOR AN D WR ITE R. jeremy@jeremyelwood.com

Losing the plot Which election is this one again?

A ... THE BILLBOARDS HAVE TAKEN ON A MORE LOCAL FLAVOUR, RANGING FROM THE SLICKLY PRODUCED, TO THE QUIRKY, TO THE DOWNRIGHT BIZARRE.

t this time of year, the focus of virtually all political debate has moved away from local issues, and onto national ones. It’s a general election year, and so the media are quite understandably focused on who will end up running the country after September.

Council issues have to take a back seat unless, of course, you live in Christchurch where, sadly but quite rightly, your regional concerns look set to play a vote-getting or vote-losing role for the foreseeable future.

This election, however, has something of the feel of a local body campaign. The usual suspects are there dominating hoarding space and appealing to voters’ desires for either continuity or change.

Alongside them, we have the now wellestablished smaller parties, running on a narrower range of issues and appealing to more specific groups within our society – the Greens, Ma¯ori Party and New Zealand First all have equivalent candidates in local body elections, those small teams who are campaigning for cleaner water, diversity of representation or lower rates.

And we have the independent candidates, the concerned but unaffiliated individuals running for local boards.

Then there are parties such as United Future, ACT, the Conservatives and (arguably) Internet Mana, who are betting the bank on either one person’s charisma, track record or ability to drink tea with the Prime Minister.

Even the billboards have taken on a more local flavour, ranging from the slickly produced, to the quirky, to the downright bizarre. Surely with all his millions, Colin Craig could have afforded a photograph which was better than a 1978 school yearbook? But I digress.

Part of this change of tone is a direct

result of MMP. Part of it is the relative ease with which even the smallest party can get a message across in our era of social media, and a news cycle that loves nothing more than covering someone with the potential to make a fool out of themselves at any minute.

And part of it comes down to the blurring of the lines between what constitutes local and national politics in our changing country.

As mentioned above, Christchurch’s local issues affect more than just Christchurch.

They arouse nationwide sympathy, outrage and frustration, not to mention insurance premiums. Auckland’s traffic woes certainly don’t elicit the same level of sympathy (rather something more akin to schadenfreude, depending on how far south you go) but they do affect the wider economy. Conversely, decisions made during the general election campaign affect individual towns, cities and even suburbs. Try saying the word “Epsom” to any group of politically-conscious voters and see how many pairs of eyes roll, a fate East Coast Bays seems to have narrowly missed out on.

Perhaps this is why we’re seeing more and more candidate crossover between local government and the Beehive. You probably couldn’t pick two more different examples than John Banks and Lianne Dalziel, but examples they are.

So while the nation’s attention is held (or diverted, depending on your feelings about this election) by who will do a deal with whom, and where, and what for, and what goes through Winston Peter’s mind at night; remember that it does, ultimately, matter to all of us. One group of these… insert your own descriptive noun here…will end up running the country, and that country includes all of us, wherever we may live. LG

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FRANA DIVICH / ON LEGAL ISSUES PARTN E R AT H EAN EY & PARTN E R S. frana.divich@heaneypartners.com

Weathertight homes What does the Supreme Court decision on eligibility mean for councils?

O

COUNCILS SHOULD RESIST ISSUING CODE COMPLIANCE CERTIFICATES FOR HISTORIC MONOLITHICALLY-CLAD HOUSES UNTIL THE MINISTRY OF BUSINESS, INNOVATION AND EMPLOYMENT ISSUES A DETERMINATION COMPELLING THEM TO DO SO.

n 10 June 2014 the Supreme Court released its judgment Osborne v Auckland Council. In the media much was made of the judgment’s impact. But what does it really mean for councils?

At the outset, it is important to note that the appeal was concerned with eligibility to take a claim to the Weathertight Homes Tribunal under the Weathertight Homes Resolution Services Act 2006 (the Act). It was not about liability.

The court examined s14(a) of the Act. S14 sets out the criteria homeowners must meet in order to have an eligible claim. Part of the criteria is that the house “... was built … within the period of 10 years immediately before the day on which the claim is brought...”

In the High Court and Court of Appeal the word “built” was given its natural meaning: the house was standing and complete. The Supreme Court said that the word “built” in the Act was intended to be interpreted by reference to the expression “building work” in the long stop limitation provision of the Building Act (which encompasses code compliance certification).

Simply put − if the code compliance certificate (CCC) was issued after the house was built, the claim will be eligible if the application is made to the Weathertight Homes Resolution Service within 10 years from the date the CCC was issued, rather than the date the house was completed.

Since 2002 there have been many claims that have been deemed not eligible based on what the Supreme Court has said is an incorrect interpretation of “built”. Some

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cases that were deemed eligible we were able to successfully reverse the eligibility finding via judicial review arguing that the chief executive or the tribunal chair had incorrectly assessed the “built date” as being the date the CCC was issued, when it had been standing and completed earlier.

It is likely that many of these previously “ineligible” homeowners have moved on by selling the house or by bringing their claim in a court (where there are no eligibility hurdles to overcome).

Where there is exposure is in situations where the CCC has been issued by the council some years after the house was standing. If the house was built more than 10 years ago, but the CCC was issued less than 10 years ago, then these claims will be deemed eligible when previously they would not have been.

Limitation will be harder to argue because the council made the decision to issue the CCC within the 10-year period. It is also more likely that the council will be the only entity to have done something within the limitation period and there will be no one else to sue.

Although the judgment is not concerned with liability it does highlight the need for councils to take care when issuing CCCs for historic building work. It is essential that councils have sound practices in place that allow them to be satisfied on reasonable grounds that the building work complies.

Councils should resist issuing CCCs for historic monolithically-clad houses until the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment issues a determination compelling them to do so. LG

MALCOLM ABERNETHY / FROM CIVIL CONTRACTORS NZ EXECUTIVE OFFICE R, CIVI L CONTRACTOR S NZ (formerly NZ Contractors’ Federation) malcolm@nzcontractors.co.nz

Let’s talk Councils and contractors all stand to gain from prequalification templates.

I LET’S WORK COLLABORATIVELY ON DEVELOPING A PREQUALIFICATION MODEL THAT REDUCES THE TIME AND COST TO BOTH PREPARE BIDS AND EVALUATE TENDERS.

t’s time for contractors to work more closely with local government to develop a prequalification system that many councils can adopt irrespective of their size, internal structure or culture. I envisage a system with a generic base from which councils can select processes, adapt them to suit their particular circumstances and develop a procurement process that is unique yet practical. Most importantly, I imagine a process that saves both time and money while still ensuring quality project delivery outcomes.

Fine ideals, I hear you say. How would that work? There are many reasons why councils may argue against such an idea but there are also many reasons they should at least consider the concept.

Four years ago NZ Contractors’ Federation surveyed its members to find out how much it cost them to respond to a request for tender.

Across many projects of varying size we determined the cost was around four percent of a project’s value. When you consider that five tenders may be received for any one job, the wider industry has spent a staggering 20 percent of the contract value on bidding.

The successful tenderer gets this investment back on this job but the competing tenderers do not. Their only recourse is to increase their overhead component on the next job.

Now, consider the cost of tender evaluation which independent studies have shown is in the order of two percent of the contract value. This does not even take into account the cost of preparing the Request for Tender (RTF) document.

If you extrapolate these figures across the many work areas where services are procured, the cost to councils and New Zealand Inc is enormous.

There is a better way. Let’s work

collaboratively on developing a prequalification model that reduces the time and cost to both prepare bids and evaluate tenders. Then let’s put these time and cost savings into activities that construct and maintain more and better infrastructure.

There are examples of prequalification in New Zealand and overseas that work and save the client money. Prequalification can be used to eliminate those non-price attributes that don’t change from contract to contract such as relevant experience, track record, management skills, technical skills and resources. These items can be assessed as part of a prequalification system and updated based on performance as the contractor wins and completes projects.

It really is that simple.

When preparing the RFT consider those deal-breaking activities or items that the winner must have. They may include specialist resources, particular technical skills or a methodology that has the least impact on the environment. In addition, ask specific questions relevant to your project and know in advance the range of acceptable answers and what score they may gain.

While this approach may require additional time at the outset this should ultimately be recovered at the tender box in price and internally by reduced administrative costs.

Civil Contractors NZ is working with a number of councils to see how a prequalification system could be introduced in their area and what their specific needs may be. We’re looking to set up a model prequalification template that councils can adapt to their way of doing business.

Please feel free to contact me if your council would like to explore ways to develop and implement a prequalification system. LG

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LAWRENCE YULE / FROM LGNZ PR ESI DE NT OF LOCAL G OVE R N M E NT N EW Z EALAN D (LG NZ). lawrence.yule@hdc.govt.nz

On common goals Regional development requires a shared national approach.

I REGIONAL ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT IS A BIG THORNY ISSUE FOR BOTH LOCAL AND CENTRAL GOVERNMENT TO ADDRESS TOGETHER.

n my last column, I shared with you the vision of LGNZ: local democracy powering community and national success.

In the dictionary, success is defined as “the favourable or prosperous termination of attempts or endeavours, the accomplishment of one’s goals; the attainment of wealth, position, honours or the like”. Local government’s goal for community and national success is to see communities in a vibrant position and economic growth creating wealth across all of New Zealand.

To achieve this goal, we need to find ways to develop regional centres into environments which offer opportunities in education, employment and business, as places where skilled locals want to stay and set up business, and where skilled migrants want to settle. As demographics continue to change, with some regions growing but others losing population, regional economic development is a big thorny issue for both local and central government to address together.

In the 2014 manifesto I launched at our recent conference, LGNZ laid out the goal that we want the incoming government to work with us on the development of a joint strategy to strengthen New Zealand’s regional economies.

Regional development was one of the core themes at the 2014 LGNZ Conference in Nelson last month, where NZIER principal economist Shamubeel Eaqub spoke about the opportunities and risks arising from New Zealand’s changing regions. In his keynote address, BERL chief economist Dr Ganesh Nana said the world is changing fast and New Zealand needs to think about its vision for the future.

Leader of the Opposition David Cunliffe launched Labour’s $200 million regional development fund at our conference, for projects that will have community-wide benefits and generate jobs in regions across

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New Zealand. While this is a good start, we need to think more strategically about a shared national approach for regional development and any activity undertaken needs to be sustainable.

A strong link between local government and the business sector will be important for economic growth across all of New Zealand.

The Business Friendly Councils guidelines that LGNZ released in February to encourage economic development across the country identifies the different ways councils can support local businesses.

LGNZ held a Major Issues Seminar in Wellington last month that outlined the need for economic growth across all of New Zealand, asking how we can achieve prosperity and growth across the country, what the barriers are to this and how central and local government can work with businesses to achieve growth.

Speakers Minister of Economic Development Steven Joyce, Labour Spokesperson for Economic Development Grant Robertson and Shamubeel Eaqub all had interesting views on the topic. What was clear from the discussions was that there needs to be a common approach between central and local government whilst allowing regions, towns and cities to play to their particular strengths within that overall strategy.

Local government is in active dialogue with central government on issues that matter to regional communities including infrastructure and the growth of provincial New Zealand.

We are major contributors on issues such as roading, water and climate change; and a vital cog in the engine of economic, social and community growth. By continuing the strong forward momentum the sector has and with continued focus on regional development, we can work together to make New Zealand’s cities, towns and regions successful today and for future generations. LG

Addressing regional development and growth across all of New Zealand New Zealand’s economic growth strategy needs to consider the nation as a whole and the needs of its regions. We need to find ways to make our regional centres attractive for investment and to be somewhere skilled locals want to stay and skilled migrants want to settle in. For this to occur LGNZ believes there needs to be a shared national strategy to address regional development and growth across all of New Zealand.

New Zealand currently faces uneven economic growth with some regions growing faster than others and some regions attracting population and others losing population. Auckland continues to develop into an international city and Christchurch rebuilds itself from devastating earthquake damage in 2010 and 2011.

Auckland has been growing rapidly and is now home to 1.4 million people out of New Zealand’s total 4.5 million population. The city needs to be able to meet the demands of its growing number of citizens. While New Zealand needs Auckland to succeed, Auckland needs the rest of the country to succeed.

The Canterbury region suffered extensive damage, particularly in the February 2011 magnitude 6.3 earthquake. It is now undergoing a rebuild process and has been the focus of much central government attention and resources.

However, while Auckland and Christchurch are both critical to New Zealand’s success, the country’s economic growth strategy needs to consider the nation as a whole and the needs of its regions. LGNZ is committed to enabling and supporting economic growth across the whole country.

Local and central government need to work together to reduce regional inequalities across all of New Zealand. We want to develop a shared national approach.

We need to find ways to develop our regional centres into environments which offer opportunities in education, employment and business; as places where skilled locals want to stay and set up business, and where skilled migrants want to settle.

To benefit regions, LGNZ wants to see a share of the royalties from mineral, oil and gas extraction distributed to the communities where the extraction takes place to ensure those communities that bear the cost also reap some of the benefits.

Local government is actively exploring and embracing options to stimulate our local economies including investment in Economic Development and Regional Tourism organisations. Wider than this, we need central government to partner with us on a shared approach to deliver growth that will provide benefits to all regions of New Zealand.

LGNZ will be holding a national roadshow towards the end of the year to progress the conversation we started at conference about a national strategy for regional economic development. We want to partner with central government to develop this strategy and the roadshow will give stakeholders and local leaders the opportunity to surface the issues, listen and showcase the successful initiatives that are already happening in their regions.

Taking this further – the roadshow will explore how central government and local government can provide the right environment for investment with a focus on what the business community needs. The spotlight will be on local government as collaborative leaders in regional economic development and the main question to answer is what needs to be done that hasn’t been done before.

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Strengthening Sector Support LGNZ is delighted to announce the Preferred Partners programme, a new associate membership giving recognition to LGNZ supporters who work with the local government sector. This new programme highlights companies and organisations that deliver sector value to local government in New Zealand and has been launched as part of LGNZ’s ongoing commitment to supporting members to strengthen governance and performance.

LGNZ is delighted to welcome its five founding Preferred Partners. The four below and FairWay Resolution.

NZRA The New Zealand Recreation Association (NZRA) aims to lead and develop capability in the sport and recreation sector. This includes assisting local government to create and maintain sport and recreation opportunities, which play a key role in fostering healthy, engaged communities.

NZRA Chief Executive Andrew Leslie says LGNZ does an important job and the Preferred Partners programme is a positive means of supporting this work. NZRA aims to raise awareness of the benefits that investment in sport and recreation offers.

“Any successful organisation or sector understands and caters for the needs of its customers and the same is true of local government. We encourage all councils to stay engaged with the sport and recreation needs of their communities to maximise the recreation opportunities and associated social, health, environmental and economic benefits of the recreation facilities and spaces they provide,” says Mr Leslie.

Giblin Group is a specialist consultancy assisting local government and Iwi to develop and deliver on their plans and projects. Its services are built on three workstreams, the first being strategy and planning. Giblin Group provides highquality research and analysis to develop pragmatic, integrated and achievable strategies, plans and policies. The second workstream is community engagement and communications, enabling councils and organisations to make sound decisions and deliver great outcomes through quality consultation and engagement. The third is major project capital raising - Giblin Group uses its proven methodology to successfully secure capital for major social infrastructure projects.

Giblin Group’s Director Jenni Giblin says Giblin Group works with councils right across New Zealand, so we get to see how a range of councils operate. “No matter how big or small, the best yardstick for success is whether a council is using the resources it has efficiently and effectively.”

EROAD

New Zealand Motor Caravan Association

EROAD is a fully integrated technology, road charging and services provider. It was the first company in the world to implement a GPS/cellular based road charging platform across an entire country. Its advanced technology provides road charging, compliance and commercial services with the same platform to lower overall client and delivery costs.

The New Zealand Motor Caravan Association (NZMCA) is a membership based organisation representing over 53,000 individual members who are private owners of motor caravans and caravans, rather than rental companies. Membership links private owners up with a network of privately owned Park Over Properties (POP’s) and NZMCA parks to help them experience new adventures, find secret destinations and have great memories.

EROAD is a trusted party of our clients and the government, and our hardware and architecture have been designed to meet the highest performance, financial and evidential standards.

EROAD’s goal is to offer innovative solutions based on its core technology platform to assist in the creation of a transport sector that is responsive to the evolving needs of business, government and the wider community.

EROAD’s user-friendly fleet management tools provide instant visibility of your vehicles and their proximity to tasks, improving fleet utilisation and operational efficiency, and reducing costs.

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Giblin Group

Chief Executive Bruce Lochore says NZCMA jumped at the opportunity to become a Preferred Partner with LGNZ as it has had strong contact with the local government sector, particularly recently regarding the Freedom Camping bylaw.

“The whole [Freedom Camping] situation became a little overheated which didn’t benefit anyone at the time. It did, however, create a starting point for dialogue. We discovered we had shared values in a number of areas which we could focus on, for the benefit of all parties,” Mr Lochore says.

New EquiP partnerships NZTA EquiP, LGNZ’s Centre of Excellence, has entered into a significant new partnership with the NZ Transport Agency to establish the new Road Transportation Unit.

The Unit will embed best practice in road asset management at both the governance and engineering level. Flowing out of the work the crosssector Roading Efficiency Group conducted, the Road Transportation Unit will assist with the introduction of the One Network Road Classification (ONRC) and will share best practice from clustering and collaboration of local authorities. It will be supported by practical advice on how to maximise the value from embedding this system over the longer term.

Dr Steven Finlay, EquiP’s Manager of Business Solutions, travelled the country in August to present at workshops that discussed performance measures for the ONRC. Asset managers, roading managers and transport engineers from Road Controlling Authorities (RCAs) as well as NZ Transport Agency staff, elected members and other stakeholders attended the sessions.

“EquiP has been encouraged so far by the strong response and engagement received in these workshops, as part of NZTA’s consultation on performance measures. I was thrilled with the level of engagement between RCAs and EquiP,” Dr Finlay says. “We are now rolling out services under this partnership to support RCAs in developing fundable business cases for investment.”

FairWay Resolution FairWay Resolution delivers services in adjudication, conflict coaching, customer complaint systems, dispute resolution services, facilitation, mediation, skill development and system design. FairWay has appointed Jenny Rowan, former mayor of Kapiti Coast District Council, to lead its relationship with the local government sector.

“As an industry-leading conflict management organisation, we are very excited to be collaborating with EquiP and KnowHow to develop and deliver capacity building services to assist councils to reduce the cost of conflict and enhance community relationships,” Ms Rowan says. “For me, a successful local government sector would be one that gives professional leadership, in all aspects of its functions, as a customer service provider to their respective communities. This would be done in a timely and transparent manner, underpinning the workings of a democracy.”

Crown-owned FairWay is focussed on developing relationships with key partners and clients by reducing the cost of doing business by helping clients to better understand conflicts, help them build capacity to manage and prevent them, and where necessary, assist in resolving them in an independent and fair manner. Central government expects Fairway to contribute to the Government’s Business Growth Agenda to support business and help create a more productive and competitive economy.

This also aligns with the intent of the Local Government Act to develop more effective and efficient councils.

Upcoming KnowHow workshops 5 September: IoD/KnowHow – Applied Governance Essentials for Local Government / Selwyn This workshop provides an understanding of the role and fundamental responsibilities of a council in a governance setting. Distinguishing between direction and managing, attendees will understand the purpose and differing roles.

It covers what good governance is in a council context, how to create an effective governance culture, effective compliance and more.

26 Sep: Infrastructure Management / Hastings Did you know 70% of New Zealand’s assets are owned and managed by local and regional authorities? Elected members play an important role in the stewardship of these assets. This workshop focuses on the key concepts of this critical area and the long-term management of community infrastructure assets. Topics include lifecycle strategies, the long-term viability of an asset and risk management.

26 Sep: Making Governance Work for You and Your Community / Christchurch The purpose of this workshop is to equip those attending with sufficient knowledge of what has been happening with community or neighbourhood governance to make recommendations within their own councils about whether and how to promote a community governance approach. Dr Paul Leistner from Portland, Oregon, who is recognised across the United States as a leader in the ‘how to’ of community governance, is one of the presenters at this workshop. It covers good practice in implementing community governance.

To register for KnowHow workshops please visit www.lgnz.co.nz/equip-and-knowhow/

FairWay, EquiP and KnowHow will help: • build capability in councils by offering tailored conflict management training for local government; • improve interactions with the community by helping councils manage daily domestic complaints; • resolve RMA disputes earlier by providing you with experienced, professional mediators who know local government and the RMA – at a much lower cost than litigation; and • provide conflict coaching and strategies to resolve conflict between colleagues and external stakeholders to improve productivity and relationships.

FairWay is also proud to be an LGNZ Preferred Partner member and is excited to be working with LGNZ through EquiP and KnowHow. FairWay has identified local government as a sector positioned to transform itself and it believes it can play a significant role in building capability in some critical areas. FairWay will work through LGNZ to help councils better manage conflict that is slowing down productivity, achievement of outcomes and damaging public trust.

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The Final Word Celebrating success in local government On 21 July, during the annual LGNZ conference dinner, the inaugural 2014 LGNZ EXCELLENCE Awards were presented at a prestigious dinner in front of nearly 600 delegates from local government, central government and industry.

The EXCELLENCE Awards were designed to give local government an avenue to celebrate its successes and demonstrate its value to all of New Zealand.

They give national recognition to the work driven by New Zealand councils to build stronger communities and develop local economies. It is more important than ever that we tell this story and tell it well.

The Award categories included Community Event of the Year; Local Economic Contribution; Infrastructure Project of the Year and the EXCELLENCE Award for Community Impact. There was also an

The winners: Fulton Hogan EXCELLENCE Award for Community Impact Kawerau District Council: Kawerau Adopt a Nation - 2013 World Rafting Champs MartinJenkins EXCELLENCE Award for Local Economic Contribution Hauraki District Council: Hauraki Rail Trail Beca Infrastructure Project of the Year Kapiti Coast District Council: Kapiti Water Supply Project LGNZ Community Event of the Year Napier City Council: Tremains’ Art Deco Weekend The Skills Organisation Outstanding Contribution to Local Government Frana Cardno, Mayor of Southland District from 1992 - 2013

award, given to Frana Cardno, Mayor of Southland District from 1992 - 2013, for Outstanding Contribution to Local Government.

The Awards were designed to showcase council projects, programmes and people who have made a real impact in our local communities. They celebrated real examples of New Zealand innovation including a range of leadership, events and infrastructure projects from roading, bridges and water supply to recreational projects such as parks, playgrounds and community events.

Kawerau District Council’s “Kawerau Adopt a Nation – 2013 World Rafting Champs” won the Fulton Hogan EXCELLENCE Award for Community Impact and is a prime example of a council that has generated an enormous level of community engagement and positivity that will have lasting effects on its community.

Hauraki District Council took out the MartinJenkins EXCELLENCE Award for Local Economic Contribution for the “Hauraki Rail Trail.”

Cycleways across the country are known to bring valuable economic benefits and the Hauraki Rail Trail is a perfect example of how these cycleways can benefit the community and beyond.

The Beca Infrastructure Project of the Year was awarded to Kapiti Coast District Council for the “Kapiti Water Supply Project.” The council took a practical and innovative approach to dealing with water shortages in dry years, as well as keeping an eye on meeting future demand. The process was particularly well-managed and deserves to be acknowledged in the sector as an innovative project that used existing infrastructure in different ways.

Napier City Council has been a consistent presence in the events space and took away the prize of Community Event of the Year for the long standing “Tremains Art Deco Weekend.” The glamorous 1930s-style event brings more than 35,000 people to Napier each year and has steadily grown from its two day festival that began in 1989 to a full week with more than 200 events such as fashion shows, outdoor concerts and vintage car parades.

The sector should be proud of its achievements as we celebrate these outstanding projects and individuals – and indeed the work that happens in our councils every day.

These things happen quietly.

But someone has to make a noise about them.

The Local Government New Zealand EXCELLENCE Awards celebrate the work that our local councils do, and the things that ordinarily happen quietly, unheralded, yet things that have an immense positive impact on our communities and local economies.

So join us in recognising these councils, people and their achievements.

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REFLECTIONS ON UPSTREAM ENERGY IS THE MAGAZINE FOR ALL UPSTREAM ENERGY INDUSTRY SECTORS. OIL & GAS IN FOCUS

The upstream energy industry’s only print magazine is now published four times a year and each issue has a distinct commercial theme.

Vol.8 No.2 2014

Summer (January) PERSPECTIVES

An annual report on the country’s upstream energy sectors written by selected association chiefs, expert commentators and industry representatives, who reflect on the previous year and ‘forecast’ the coming year. Described as the ‘primer’ for the country’s upstream energy scene.

Autumn (April) OIL & GAS IN FOCUS

An annual review of our petroleum and hydro-carbon industry, with a focus on large projects and activity sites around the Taranaki region, and exploration and future plans in other prospective regions.

INNOVATIONS & TRENDS Vol.8 No.2 2014

Winter (July) INNOVATIONS & TRENDS

Looking at upstream energy sectors in terms of innovations and trends in project design, plant building and project operations. We cover equipment, technology, software, methodology, operational trends, and look at what’s around the corner for our future.

Spring (October) AUTOMATION

A wide review of automation processes in all upstream energy sectors.

AUTOMATION Vol.8 No.2 2014

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