There was no dispute at yesterday’s Dunedin City Council meeting that action was needed — but ‘‘it is about the ‘how’’’, Mayor Sophie Barker said.
‘‘We do want to be a city that cares and a city that looks after our most vulnerable,’’ she said.
Councillors weighed the trade-offs between a housing outreach service delivered in-house or one outsourced to an external provider.
In-house delivery, with an annual cost of about $270,000, provided greater control and long-term alignment with council systems, a meeting report said.
For a similar cost, an external model offered faster implementation and lower short-term risk.
A motion for the service to be externally delivered was lost 6-7, before councillors voted 9-3 to approve in-house delivery, expected to be in place about mid-year.
‘‘When you own a business on George St, to think it’s OK to ring the police every day on somebody who’s obviously drunk in the daytime,’’ she said, alluding to recent comments by Cr Brent Weatherall.
‘‘If you talk to that person about why they’re drunk [they’ll] tell you about the horrible things that happened to them,’’ Cr Mayhem said.
George St retailer Cr Weatherall, who spoke in support of a external model, said he would continue to call the police when people were not abiding by the law.
‘‘Homelessness does require empathy from all ratepayers who are often wrongly referred to as entitled or privileged for owning their own homes or businesses,’’ he said.
‘‘Yet they are the very people who are going to be funding this initiative, so the least we can do as entitled councillors is to show accountability and provide the ratepayer maximum results for the dollars we will be spending.’’
Plans for action have been under way since September, when councillors agreed, in principle, to established the service.
In November, they narrowly voted to ask for expressions of interest to operate the service rather than proceed straight to an in-house model, causing a delay over which several councillors expressed frustration yesterday.
Chief executive Sandy Graham said she felt it was ‘‘overly optimistic’’ the in-house model would be up and running by June, given the recruitment process for the model’s two new fulltime equivalent roles.
The council yesterday resolved the in-house model would be in place ‘‘as close as possible’’ to the beginning of July.
Cr Benedict Ong supported an in-house model, in part due to the new jobs it created at the council.
He said a councillor he declined to name had asked if he understood ‘‘what [he] had done’’ in opposing an external provider.
Cr Ong told the meeting he understood fully.
Infighting between councillors over decision-making was also laid bare in an explosive email chain released to media earlier this month, including criticism of plans to consider the matter in private.
A confidential report on details of the council’s preferred external provider was considered behind closed doors for more than an hour at the meeting’s outset before further public discussion and debate.
The votes
That the homeless outreach service be delivered through a contracted service arrangement with the preferred provider
For (6): Mayor Sophie Barker, Crs Cherry Lucas, Russell Lund, Andrew Simms, Lee Vandervis and Brent Weatherall.
Against (7): Crs John Chambers, Christine Garey, Doug Hall, Mandy Mayhem, Benedict Ong, Mickey Treadwell and Steve Walker.
Absent (1): Cr Marie Laufiso.
For (9): Mayor Barker, Crs Chambers, Garey, Hall, Mayhem, Ong, Simms, Treadwell and Walker.
Against (3): Crs Lucas, Vandervis and Weatherall.
Absent (2): Crs Laufiso and Lund.
