Three plans vs a looming deadline on Wellington City Council crunch day

Tuesday, 26 November 2024

Wellington Mayor Tory Whanau is putting through her own set of cuts and saves.

The deadline will be nigh, the scalpels will be out, and the observer will watch on as the Wellington City Council works against the clock to find hundreds of millions of dollars in savings on Tuesday.

It is understood three separate agendas will play out at Tuesday’s long-term plan committee.

Option one was to go with officer advice which amounted to cuts to an array of spending including reducing the size of the Golden Mile development and slowing the cycleway roll out.

Ben McNulty says the central city priority is problematic.

Mayor Tory Whanau is putting forward her own plan. She was still working through her changes but a draft late on Monday showed the council pushing on with the Golden Mile project in its entirety, cutting $40 million over 10 years from cycleways, and demolishing the Begonia House.

A new Kilbirnie skate park would survive but the new Huetepara Park in Lyall Bay would lose funding while the Karori events centre would be sold.

Whanau said her savings would amount to about $280m. This was well-short of the $500m the council earlier said it would need but Whanau said new insurance information had drastically reduced the council’s insurance risk.

Councillor Ben McNulty said asking suburban communities to accept cuts while the central city got works was “problematic”.

Councillor Teri O’Neill: ‘Pulling funding now [for Huetepara Park] would waste public money and years of community effort.

However, by Monday afternoon, less than 20 hours before the meeting was due to start, he said councillors were still yet to get the official wording, which they needed if they wanted to make their own amendments.

Plans to ditch the Huetepara Park are set to meet opposition from Motukairangi/Eastern ward councillor Teri O’Neill.

“Pulling funding now would waste public money and years of community effort. Mana whenua gifted this project its name and have guided it from the start. We can’t walk away from that partnership,” she said.

It is understood a third plan is planned from the council’s right flank that would cut the Golden Mile and cycleways but retain some community projects – effectively the opposite of Whanau’s.

The reason for the cuts was a recent but heated decision by the council to retain its 34% stake in Wellington Airport. With much of its its long-term plan relying on the sale, the council now needs to amend its long-term plan and Whanau set an end-of November deadline to come up with a draft plan to go out for consultation. She confirmed a decision had to be made on Tuesday.

The savings are needed to feed into the $500m – since revised – that the council needs to make up to address its under-insurance gap and create a disaster fund. The sale of the airport shares were meant to be used for that.

Local Government Minister Simeon Brown, largely spurred by the council having to amend its long-term plan, earlier in the month appointed Lindsay McKenzie to observe the council for him and help it work through the process despite the council’s warring factions.

Councillor Diane Calvert said the Golden Mile should not be prioritised when basic work such as footpath upgrades were being cost-analysed.