​Key outcomes from Ordinary Council meeting 18 March 2025

You can watch the recording of the meeting on Council’s YouTube channel.

Please note these are informal notes on the key outcomes from the meeting. The formal minutes and official record will be endorsed at the next council meeting.

Minutes and Committees – Council endorsed, received or confirmed the minutes of several meetings and committees including the March extra ordinary council meeting, Performance and Delivery Committee meeting, Risk and Assurance Committee, and the Coast Community Board meeting.

Papers also included the regular reports from the CEO and Mayor.

Public submissions – There were no public speakers at this meeting.

Hukutaia Plan change – for many years, Hukutaia has been on council’s radar as a logical next place to accommodate future growth and help address the existing housing shortage in the township. After an unsuccessful bid for funding support through the Infrastructure Acceleration Fund, council has looked into other ways to support the proposed plan change. One of these is the Streamlined Planning Process (SPP), formally submitting a request to the Minister for a faster plan change process. This paper outlined how that project could run, with timeframes, technical assessments, stakeholder engagement strategies and regional consenting requirements.

There was some discussion (from around minute 16 in the recording) between councillors about costs, who carries those costs, the role of development contributions, possible opportunities for current residents in Hukutaia to be involved in this process, the pros and cons of the use of ‘fast track’ consenting, the suitability of different zoning options. The Chief Executive noted that the paper was only about the Plan Change (the next administrative step in developing the Hukutaia Growth Area). Other matters, in particular the development of infrastructure and a plan for development contributions, would be developed in parallel with the plan change and come back to council for decisions.

Following that, the council voted to move forward with the process outlined in the project plan and confirm with the Minister the eligibility of the Hukutaia Plan Change for the SPP process.

2025 pre-election report and election policy adoption – local government elections are this October. There are several preliminary matters that councillors must decide in advance of those elections. Noting that some of this information may change once we know the outcomes of the review by the Local Government Commission.

In this paper council adopted:

• a Pre-Election Policy for 11 July 2025 to 11 October 2025 (this is about making sure that council doesn’t promote and isn’t seen to promote the election prospects of a sitting member. It sets out the rules to make sure it is fair and council resources aren’t used in any way by current councillors for the purpose of re-election).
• Election Protocols for Staff for a similar period (this sets out the rules for staff and contractors of council in the three months before elections. This includes rules around political neutrality, what to do if a staff member runs for mayor or councillor, and not using council resources for any political work)
• the alphabetical ordering of names for the 2025 triennial election (the same as 2022 elections).

BOPLASS SOI and half-yearly report - BOPLASS is a company owned by nine councils to make savings through joint procurement, shared services and other efficiencies. Examples discussed included cyber-security insurance cover and other insurances. The BOPLASS Statement of Intent sets out the activities and intentions of BOPLASS Ltd for the coming financial year and the Half Yearly Report is also provided (for information only).

Public excluded business – council confirmed in-committee meeting minutes and workshop notes. Also discussed in confidential was Te Ranginui Cemetery lease of surplus land.