Sad final farewells for Matatā managed retreat fighters

Wednesday, 30 March 2022

In 2019, Matatā residents were still vowing to fight managed retreat. Video first published July 2019.

The last house remaining in Matatā’s red zone will today be surrendered for demolition, marking the legal end of a protracted and painful managed retreat process. Nikki Macdonald counts the cost to residents and considers the lessons for risk-prone communities such as Westport and Tokomaru Bay.

“It’s going to be a bad day,” Pam Whalley says.

The 80-year-old will today hand over the keys to the last home still standing in Matatā’s debris flow red zone. The home her husband built 29 years ago. The home she has spent a decade fighting to save.

On the same day, she will bid a final farewell to former neighbour Marilyn Pearce – another staunch opponent of the managed retreat that has scattered the Bay of Plenty community.

**READ MORE:

Pam Whalley, son Rick and his wife Rachel, at the beloved Matatā house she is today surrendering to demolition. (File photo)

* Six months after eviction day, one man remains in Matatā's red zone

* The last resident of Matatā's red zone today becomes an illegal squatter on his own land

The 2005 debris flow dumped silt, debris and boulders on Matatā.

* Moving day at Matatā - the end of one family's fight against managed retreat

* Mismanaged retreat? The life-limiting limbo of Matatā's red zone

Bill Whalley after the debris was cleared. The couple’s house was one of three allowed to remain because it suffered no structural damage. Pam says Bill will be turning in his grave at the family’s treatment.

Pearce was so upset about being pushed out of a property that had housed six generations, that her 2020 moving day started with an ambulance instead of a removal truck.

After 10 years of fighting managed retreat, her one hope was to reclaim a stress-free life. She only got a year.

Today marks the legal end to the settlement’s long and controversial managed retreat buyout process, forcing residents out of the path of a potential debris flow.

Staunch managed retreat opponent Greg Fahey is the last man standing in Matatā’s red zone.

In 2005, after heavy rain, the Awatarariki Stream dumped 120 olympic swimming pools worth of silt, logs and boulders on to the area, taking out several houses.

Whakatāne District Council promised to construct a barrier, and residents built back. But when that plan failed in 2012, 34 property owners were left unable to build, borrow or sell, after their homes and sections were red-zoned as too dangerous to live in.

Forced to live in a shipping container and now with no neighbours, Fahey is negotiating to leave.

On March 31, 2021, a plan change finally extinguished the existing use rights of red zone residents, making them squatters on their own land. Whalley was given a year’s grace to leave.

While the area was deemed too dangerous to live in, Whalley never felt unsafe. She just wanted to live out her days in the house her husband Bill built in 1993, with savings amassed from a lifetime working in the mill at Kawerau.

Instead, the partially-sighted octogenarian is now trying to learn her way around a new rental house, 40 minutes away in Papamoa.

“Leaving was devastating, actually. Especially at my age, to have to start again. Losing all you’ve worked for all your life. We took quite a bit, but you still leave all the memories behind.

“I don’t really know where to go or what to do…Bill would be turning over in his grave.”

Marilyn Pearce was devastated to have to leave her Matatā home. In 2019, she told Stuff she had suffered stress and weight loss from being “in fight mode all the time'. She died this week.

While the Whalley home was the last house still standing in the red zone, one resident remains.

Greg Fahey’s section adjoins the Awatarariki Stream, which carried the debris flow from the hills behind. He’s living in a shipping container, as the red zone designation left him unable to build.

He has steadfastly removed to budge, demanding fair value for his section and compensation for the years of stress and uncertainty.

While Matatā’s managed retreat was related to climate change, it holds lessons for councils grappling with climate risks such as frequent flooding and sea level rise.

“I’m the last man standing down here. I’ll be known for someone who stood, not someone who folded… the principle of the whole thing is if you don’t stand up against them, they walk all over you, and that’s not going to happen.”

But now the 68-year-old wants to leave. The community is gone. Weeds are taking over. With no houses to dampen the noise, the rumble of trains and trucks is robbing him of sleep.

“The whole container shakes and everything. That’s what I’ve got to put up with. It’s no good for my health.

“It’s not the nice place that it was before. People are dumping stuff down at the bush. It’s all overgrown with gorse and everything. It’s just going to neglect.

Communities such as Tokomaru Bay, which have been hit by repeated storm damage, need to consider whether building back is the best long-term option.

“It’s not a good place to be now all the houses are gone. I just want out.”

Fahey is negotiating an exit deal with Bay of Plenty Regional Council, but there’s nothing concrete yet. While Fahey has now been a legal squatter for a year, the council says it has no plans to move from negotiation to enforcement.

“We believe RMA enforcement will not be needed.”

Councils need to identify high risk areas and come up with climate change adaptation plans, before disasters force reactive decisions based on insufficient information.

The Matatā managed retreat is believed to be the first time residents have been evicted by snuffing out their existing land use rights. While it is not due to a climate change hazard, the process has been closely watched by other councils considering how to manage growing flood and sea level rise risks. But residents have always said it is a model of what not to do.

Whalley doesn’t like the limelight. She’s only talking because she wants people to understand the toll the torturous process has taken on all those affected.

“My husband couldn’t take the stress. He had heart problems and passed away six years ago, in that house. I know the stress was a factor – he used to get himself so wound up.”

Victoria University climate change adaptation researcher Judy Lawrence says we urgently need to consider how we pay for climate change adaptation, and what we should be paying for.

In 2019, Marilyn Pearce told Stuff she had suffered stress and weight loss from being “in fight mode all the time'. She died this week.

Lessons from Matatā

The Matatā situation exposed the lack of a clear legal framework and funding mechanism for managed retreat. But it was the well-intentioned decision way back in 2005, to try to hold back the tide of mud, that ultimately caused residents the greatest grief.

“Telling people ‘Oh, you can go back, you can rebuild and have a happy life’ and then sort of going through it twice – being told everybody’s got to move out. The call should have been made a lot earlier than it was,” Whalley says.

That is the fundamental lesson from Matatā, says Victoria University climate change adaptation researcher Judy Lawrence. The council should have ensured the community could be protected long-term, before allowing residents to return.

“The people were effectively strung along, and quite rightly were outraged that they were allowed to go back and rebuild their lives and then, blow me down, the engineers decide that, no, we can’t fix it.”

And it’s a lesson that repeatedly storm-battered communities such as Westport and Tokomaru Bay should consider, Lawrence says. Instead of immediately building back, communities need to stand back and contemplate the future.

“There’s a real risk that all that will happen is that people’s houses will be fixed up, they might be raised slightly above flood level, but it’s not going to protect them in the long run. So it’s good money after bad.”

The red zone beachfront in 2019, after residents built back.

Nationally, councils need to shift from reactive to proactive, so they have a plan in place before communities are wiped out by flooding or storms, Lawrence says.

“Unless we start thinking about the future and what’s coming down the pipe, and out of the sky, we’re going to be continually in the situation where people are cleaning up, their lives are wrecked, they are making investments without adequate information.”

Councils need climate risk assessments down to community level, so they can prioritise high risk areas and consider realistic options, starting with preventing new developments, Lawrence says.

She hopes the looming National Adaptation Plan will tackle the politically difficult question of how to give residents in at-risk areas some security, without creating the “moral hazard” of the expectation of a buyout.

The Ministry for the Environment says it will consult on the draft adaptation plan from next month.

It will focus on how New Zealand can adapt to the priority risks identified in the 2020 National Climate Change Risk Assessment. They ranged from coastal ecosystems and community wellbeing to buildings and drinking water supplies.

The protracted Matatā process also highlighted legal and funding problems for managed retreat. That was reinforced by the Randerson review into the Resource Management Act, which recommended a new Managed Retreat and Climate Change Adaptation Act to create a clear legal pathway and a new adaptation fund for climate change risk reduction.

Lawrence agrees councils need a legal framework that prevents the “absolutely ridiculous” legal gymnastics required for Matatā.

“They really need the legislative instruments, otherwise it will go nowhere. So there’s great urgency to have this broader conversation, about how do we pay for adaptation? What is it that we are going to be paying for?”

However, any new law does not appear imminent. The Environment Ministry says it will consult soon on “draft concepts for managed retreat policy to inform the development of the Climate Adaptation Act”.

“A new managed retreat system will raise different sets of issues and impacts for people, whānau and communities, depending on where they are in New Zealand. We are keen to understand the varying perspectives on those issues to help inform policy development and the design of the Act,” the ministry says.

Lawrence says one critical element for successful risk planning is to take the community along with you.

Pam Whalley agrees. Nothing can make today less painful. But at least other councils can learn from their experience.

“I think communication is a big thing. Being talked to, instead of dictated to.

“To be treated like we’ve been treated – lied to and manipulated – is not right. It could have been done so differently.”

A torturous timeline

May 2005 – After heavy rain, the Awatarariki Stream dumps 120 olympic swimming pools worth of silt, logs and car-sized boulders on to Matatā.

2005-2012 Whakatāne District Council investigates engineering barriers to protect the community from another debris flow.

2012 – The council decides no engineering protection is feasible.

2015 – A risk assessment finds high risk to life and property in the debris flow path, forcing the council to act. The resulting Awatarariki Debris Flow Risk Management Programme includes 10 work streams to reduce risk, ranging from early warning systems to plan changes to prohibit new buildings. Managed voluntary retreat is work stream number 7.

2016 – The district begins property valuations and making managed retreat offers to residents (despite no funding being available). The process is “voluntary” but with the threat of future eviction by plan changes.

2017 – The process is started to enact a district plan change which prohibits new builds by rezoning the land from residential to coastal protection, and a regional plan change which effectively evicts residents by snuffing out their existing use rights.

July 2019 – Central government, Bay of Plenty Regional Council and the district council agree to a three-way split to fund the $15 million estimated cost of managed retreat. The council restarts the managed retreat offer process.

31 October 2020 – Managed retreat buyout offers expire.

31 March 2021 – Property owners’ existing use rights extinguished, making residents squatters on their own land. One resident – Pam Whalley – is given a year’s grace to leave.

31 March 2022 – Keys to last remaining home are handed over. One section owner living in a shipping container remains.