Library website takes ratepayers on a costly journey

Tuesday, 9 June 2026

The homepage of tematapihi.govt.nz, a site for and about the refurbished central library... and not much else, writes Dave Armstrong.

Dave Armstrong is a playwright and satirist based in Wellington. He is a regular opinion contributor.

OPINION: Before the old Wellington Central Library closed for redevelopment, I visited many times a week. I was often in town, and the main branch had books that you couldn’t easily access at suburban branches unless you paid a fee. But all that changed with the library’s closure and then Covid. Our library system became more efficient and suburban branches came into their own.

The reason I’ve only visited Te Matapihi once since it opened is not that I don’t like it – it’s fantastic. It’s just that I don’t need to bus, cycle or drive, and all the parking hassles that involves, into town because my suburban library is so good.

The Wellington City Libraries website (wcl.govt.nz ) is like many librarians – not flashy, under-resourced, occasionally grumpy but ultimately very helpful. As far as I know it’s maintained in-house. I can find and reserve a book at no charge, they tell me when it’s arrived at my local branch, and if I have an overdue book, I get a polite reminder. And if there’s an event on at my local library, I’ll hear about it.

But now there is a new website in town. I only found out about it because of the furore over its cost – nearly $600k for a website exclusively about Te Matapihi ki te Ao Nui (tematapihi.govt.nz). You are welcomed to the website by a skip-able karakia and can learn all about Te Matapihi: its kaupapa, the many events on, things tamariki can do – there’s a lot – and information about the building. And yes, there’s a café but don’t think you can pay cash.

Did I mention books? Sorry, if you want to access Wellington City Libraries’ excellent collection, join the library, or get out a book then you’re referred to the Wellington City Libraries’ cheap, cheerful and entirely functional website.

The inclusive Te Matapihi website has attractive photos of people from every societal group imaginable except grumpy, boomer male columnists who are red-green colour blind. I guess I can find out the opening hours on the other website.

Some critics have found Te Matapihi’s website too visually noisy, hard to navigate and with “constant interruptions by roaming graphic elements”.

Various people – some inside the IT industry others outside – have suggested the website could have been done for 2k, 20k, 40k, or 120k, but no-one has suggested anywhere near 600k. This for a website initially only meant to cost 14k. And don’t get me started on the 72k a year that the council will be charged for hosting and ongoing maintenance.

Such cost overruns make the Town Hall strengthening look parsimonious in comparison. To add salt to the wound, the website was made by Journey, an Auckland digital design company. They have an impressive CV and testimonials even if their website DOES TEND TO OVERUSE UPPER CASE TEXT WHICH I WAS ALWAYS TOLD IS SHOUTING! And I’m sorry, but I reach for my revolver when I hear a JAFA IT company talk about “content-rich web ecosystems”.

Wellington has many excellent design companies who are perfectly capable of building flashy, hard-to-navigate websites themselves and the council has its own web developers on staff. The council has also committed to hiring local where possible. Why such a massive outsource to an Auckland company?

In keeping with the council’s “Heads Won’t Roll” policy, no-one seems to be taking responsibility for the exorbitant website cost. Was there a proper procurement process? Were Wellington companies invited to tender? Was it publicly advertised on the government procurement platform (GETS)? If not, why not? The council CEO needs to answer these questions.

Deputy Mayor Ben McNulty and Councillor Diane Calvert have both been trying to get to the bottom of the debacle, but so far little information has been forthcoming from council management. Councillor Calvert conceded that “while this spending sat within the wider project budget approved before the last election, the scale of the website expenditure was not sufficiently transparent to elected members to enable proper scrutiny”.

My main beef with the website is why was it needed in the first place? The city library service is an interconnected group of suburban and central branches which work together. A kids story-time event at Johnsonville library is just as important as one at Te Matapihi. Information about Te Matapihi could easily have been included in the current Wellington City Libraries website.

The 600k could have been better spent on books, extending branch opening hours, improving the existing libraries website, paying librarians more and having more library events.

I understand the need for revenue earners like Te Papa, The Zoo or Zealandia to have attractive, flashy websites that will entice visitors to pay good money to go, but Te Matapihi?

Hopefully, the council CEO will tell us the reason for the massive blowout and who was responsible. But if the council does improve its procurement processes, please don’t create an expensive new website telling us all about it. We’ve been taken for a journey once already.