Six-page red zone document took a year to finalise
Friday, 6 March 2026
A six-page document that will guide governance of the red zone took more than a year to finalise and has been criticised for its lack of community consultation.
“I don't understand why this report has taken so long to come to us,” said Linwood councillor Yani Johanson at a Christchurch City Council meeting on Wednesday.
Tanya Wati, the elected chair of Ngāi Tūāhuriri, the sub-tribe that will control half of the governance committee seats, said the delay was necessary and it was time to get things moving.
In February last year, the council agreed in a 9-8 vote to disestablish a large committee governing the red zone in favour of a new committee with three elected members from the city council and three from Ngāi Tūāhuriri, whose territory encompasses the whole of the red zone.
The next step was to draw up terms of reference for the new committee.
Then nothing happened publicly.
In November, the council’s general manager of citizens and community, Andrew Rutledge, told The Press council staff would meet “in the coming weeks” with Whitiora Centre Ltd, a cultural consultancy that facilitates official Ngāi Tūāhuriri positions on many matters. Wati is part of Whitiora, according to its website.
Hayley Guglietta, a leading red zone advocate for almost 15 years, said no community group had been consulted about the terms of reference in the past year.
Councillor Johanson noted the two community boards with territory within the red zone had not been consulted on the terms of reference either.
“I don’t think getting community views from both the local community boards who are impacted and the community who have worked so tirelessly in this area on the terms of reference is a big ask,” he said.
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The terms of reference did also not refer to a charitable trust that is intended to take over governance of the red zone eventually.
Rutledge acknowledged this was an “oversight“ that could be remedied later.
He said the trust would likely be formed when the big infrastructure projects for flood mitigation - stop banks, settling ponds, pumping stations and such, costing many tens of millions - had been progressed.
Given the scale of works and budgets, that will be some years away.
It is not clear what work has been held up by the lack of progress over the last year. Since February 2025, a foot bridge has opened, work on the City to Sea Pathway advanced and many thousands of natives planted.
Rutledge said the council’s fast track application had been recently completed and would soon be sent to Environment Canterbury and later to the fast track authority setup by central government.
At Wednesday’s meeting, Guglietta pleaded for councillors to partially reverse their February 2025 decision to exclude community members from the committee that has yet to meet.
“Excluding a community representative … would be a serious mistake, historically, strategically, and democratically,” she said.
“The Ōtākaro Avon River Corridor exists because community members mobilised in 2011 when thousands of residents lost their homes,” she wrote in an open letter. “The vision for this land did not originate within council.”
“The kaupapa of the corridor has always been community-led restoration. Governance should reflect that origin story, not move further away from it,” she wrote.
Even co-governance with Ngāi Tūāhuriri was a community idea, she said. “It was always supposed to be the council, iwi and the community,” she said in a deputation.
She and former councillor and red zone stalwart, Chrissie Williams, urged that a community member could replace the deputy mayor on the committee.
This was unsuccessful and the terms of reference were approved by 13 votes.
Johanson and Andrei Moore voted against the motion and Celeste Donovan abstained.