Auckland Council's agency Regional Facilities Auckland to be more open

Monday, 3 February 2020

The future of Speedway at Western Springs still hasn't been decided, despite being granted a temporary reprieve in March this year (this video was produced prior to the extension of the lease).

Auckland's least transparent council agency says it will publish more of its business online in a bid to become more open.

Regional Facilities Auckland (RFA) runs major spaces across the region, including Mt Smart Stadium, the Aotea Centre, the Auckland Art Gallery and The Civic theatre.

It holds only two of its 11 monthly board meetings in public, citing a lack of interest.

Mt Smart Stadium in Auckland is run by RFA for concerts and sports events.

The agency, which spent $130 million in 2019, has been grappling with a long-running plan to re-organise and upgrade the city's stadia, including shifting Speedway from Western Springs.

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Andrew Barnes has chaired Regional Facilities Auckland since November 2018.

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An artist's impression of a possible future redevelopment of Western Springs stadium.

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Andrew Barnes, who has chaired RFA since November 2018, said he hoped that at least part of every item considered by the board would be published on its website from March.

'The challenge we have is – unlike some of the other CCOs – every topic we have has components within it that we would have to go through and redact because of their commercial in-confidence nature,' he said.

RFA was working on changing the format of board reports so that from March it would be easy to separate confidential content from passages that could be published online with the board agenda, Barnes said.

The change coincides with the start of an independent, council-commissioned review due to report mid-year on how well the decade-old structure of having the agencies carry out most council operations is working.

The structure was set up by the National-led government in 2010 to keep council operations at arm's length from the politicians.

It requires the five CCOs to conduct only two board meetings in public.

Until 2016, all operated similar to a council committee, with each meeting open to the public for business not deemed confidential.

RFA stepped back from open public meetings in March 2016 after deciding the lack of public turnout meant the effort of being that open was not worth the cost and effort.

While it publishes a monthly board meeting agenda listing the topics to be covered, it makes available none of the papers considered by directors.

Barnes said he supported the principle of transparency, but simply opening the existing board meetings to the public might not be the most effective approach.

'Because we were not getting lots of attendance, I want to have a think about how we might do something different that achieves better communications between ourselves and our community,' he said.

In a new move, Auckland Mayor Phil Goff has appointed councillors to attend board meetings in an informal role to improve communication between the agencies and the politicians.

Councillor Richard Hills, who will liaise with the RFA board, said he is due to have his first meeting with them this month.