There is a clear opportunity in the South Dunedin area to push for a determined, thoughtful and integrated urban renewal programme, writes Dunedin South MP Clare Curran.
A couple of weeks ago, I visited a retired couple in their Caversham house.
The house is only partly insulated and they experience condensation inside the windows every day during winter, and black mould grows on windowsills.
One of the inside walls was recently replaced by their landlord, which happens to be the Dunedin City Council, after several years of requests for rising damp issues to be addressed.
Most frightening was that, despite being provided with a heater by the DCC, they couldn't afford the monthly bill, so they made do with blankets on chairs and by wearing layers of clothes and scarves indoors.
The wife of this couple suffers respiratory problems, which is only to be expected living in such conditions.
Many private rentals are in much worse shape, with no attempts to insulate or provide remedies for poor ventilation and high costs of heating.
Their return on investment may even outstrip Auckland's worst housing.
The DCC does its best to manage 2700+ housing units in the city, but we are a city under stress.
When I first stood for Parliament in 2008, I campaigned on the urgent need for warm, dry housing in my electorate.
It's estimated that of the about 40,000 houses in Dunedin, 18,800 (46% of households) have residents needing to spend more than 10% of their annual household income on household fuel.
This puts them into what's called fuel poverty.
In the past six years, from what I've observed and heard, things have not improved, particularly in the part of Dunedin with the most people on low incomes, South Dunedin.
We also know thousands of homes in the South Dunedin basin spend much of the year surrounded by swampy ground with groundwater just centimetres beneath the soil.
This area, inhabited by about 10,000 residents, sits at mean sea level and faces a possible 0.3m rise in groundwater by 2040 because of rising sea levels.
This part of Dunedin contains infrastructure worth around $4.3 billion, including wastewater and stormwater assets.
Sobering statistics based on last year's census provide context.
The median household income in South Dunedin is $26,100, 35% of households with children have one parent, 36% of households have no vehicle and 48% (almost half) have no access to the internet.
These are issues for our whole community.
They are issues of extreme poverty, ill health, Victorian-style living conditions and neglect.
As evidence of that, the only real public facility available in South Dunedin is a public toilet.
For years, pressure for a library and community facility in South Dunedin has been met with promises which inevitably get delayed and deferred.
There has always a reason, whether it's spending millions on cycleways, stadium debt, other priorities.
It's a fact this community has for decades put up with tinkering around the edges and rhetoric which is not followed by action.
In South Dunedin, 60.3% of housing is private rentals, overwhelmingly tenanted by people on very low incomes, whether fixed or waged.
The focus must be largely on them, though the solutions lie in much stronger collaboration between central and local government and passionate advocacy groups.
There are community initiatives trying to make a difference.
The DCC has been part of a national housing Warrant of Fitness trial this year which aims to find a national standard for warm, dry housing.
The Cosy Homes Governance Group has been set up comprising representatives from many public and social agencies, including the Southern District Health Board, Dunedin City and Otago Regional councils, Work and Income New Zealand, Presbyterian Support and others.
The big question has always been what to do about the private rentals and how can we ensure these houses meet a standard.
What to do?
There is a clear opportunity to push for a determined, thoughtful and integrated urban renewal programme in the South Dunedin area.
Instead of seeing this as the ''biggest community issue facing Dunedin'', let's see it as the biggest opportunity for urban change.
Labour has proposed major housing reform with a promise to build 10,000 affordable new homes for first-home buyers each year for 10 years to try to address our housing crisis throughout New Zealand.
We will also amend the Residential Tenancies Act to require landlords to insulate and provide an efficient heating source before a house can be rented out.
This is a Warrant of Fitness guarantee that every child growing up in a rental property has a warm, dry home.
Labour's policy is backed by both landlords' lobby group the Property Investors' Federation, which has described it as ''sensible and pragmatic'', as well as by the New Zealand College of Public Health Medicine.
We are also committed to urban renewal.
The South Dunedin community is a clear case for an urban redevelopment programme led by government in partnership with that community, the city and others.
This is not rhetoric.
It is essential.
It is past time for piecemeal measures and rhetoric in our city.
South Dunedin has some strong voices speaking out on its behalf.
It is time they were really listened to.
