Council’s liability for flood damage questioned

By Laura Kvigstad, Auckland Council reporter. Public Interest Journalism funded through NZ On Air.

Auckland Council staff say that queries have been received over council’s liability in recent flood events.

Governance director Phil Wilson mentioned the enquiries about liability at the Governing Body meeting on March 23, when he updated councillors about the recovery from recent flood events.

“People are challenging whether council is liable for costs associated with private property damage that is adjacent to council land,” Wilson said. “We are seeing the start of a process that will probably carry on for quite some time.” or consequences, citing a recent attempt to steal a trolley of groceries (valued at $900) from Ōrewa New World.

Wilson did not have much information about that aspect available for councillors but said he would be looking to give more in the coming weeks.

Council was approached for clarity on whether it had received any formal legal challenges as yet, but did not respond by the time of publication.

Council is also conducting reassessments for stickered properties.

“There is most certainly a judgement to be made about whether those properties are viable going forward,” Wilson said. He said being able to identify where it was unwise to rebuild properties gave council a good base for discussions with Government and insurers about compensation for those affected.

Mark Mitchell told the meeting that there has been a 39 percent increase retail crime and a 35 percent increase in violent crime since 2017, however police resources have not increased on a parr, adding stress to already limited resources. Inspector Laurenson also detailed why the police presence is chronically stretched.

“Multiple businesses attending the meeting were not aware of these policing figures, and gained a better understanding of why delays in crime attendance, are lengthy,” Wilkins says.

She says there is a very low level of crime reporting in the Ōrewa, with only seven thefts reported in the first three months of this year, despite daily thefts from Ōrewa businesses.

A key priority discussed at the meeting was to get the levels of reporting to a point that better reflects the actual situation.

Destination Ōrewa Beach is reminding businesses to report things such as theft, damage or unruly behaviour through the Police 105 website which enables photos and video to be attached to reports.

Wilkins says a ‘Bobby on the Beat’ around Ōrewa throughout the day would be an ideal scenario but is complex to achieve.

The Hibiscus Coast Community Patrollers have increased their presence.

Inspector Laurenson says police are not aware of a recent increase in offending in the Ōrewa town centre and have no intelligence to suggest there is significantly more crime being committed in the Ōrewa area over and above what is being reported to Police.

“We investigate all offending that is reported to us and will seek to hold offenders to account,” he says.

Mayor Wayne Brown said he was glad Wilson was “treading carefully” around conversations of managed retreat. “That is definitely tricky. We are taking a financial risk because some people chose to take a physical risk,” Mayor Brown said. Cr Wayne Walker said he was concerned that council was continuing to consent developments in hazardous areas and that it was a risk to council’s reputation. “People see subdivisions and developments around them being consented that they now know aggravate the risk of flooding where they live,” Cr Walker said. “They are really scared. They point the finger at us and say, ‘how can you be allowing this?’” “There is clearly a need for us to look longer term at our planning framework,” Wilson said. “What we look at in the next 12 months in terms of the recovery programme needs to dovetail well into those longer-term decisions.”