An increased focus on eliminating lagarosiphon, backing school buses and a deep dive into consenting are some of the priorities the Otago Regional Council is considering.
The council had a strategic action plan workshop this week, where it decided on priorities through the council’s next two years. Workshops do not involve binding decisions, which can only be made at council meetings.
Council chairwoman Hilary Calvert said it was better to come up with these priorities at the workshop rather than spending three days at a council meeting discussing what mattered to them.
The priorities had come from councillors’ thoughts from a previous workshop with help from staff.
All priorities should be able to come under current budgets, she said.
Council chief executive Richard Saunders said, unless a significant project came on to the table, he was relatively comfortable all costs should be able to be absorbed.
It was decided all science programmes would be reviewed against the needs of the community and a review of flood and drainage infrastructure and rates would be done. The rates will be reviewed in terms of possible unfairness of the urban/rural/all-of-catchment split, taking into account who benefits and who does not.
It also plans to make it clear what science and resilience work is mandatory and what is a result of council choices.
The audit and risk committee will make a deep dive into consenting and compliance to ensure they are operating fairly, transparent, at a fair cost, efficiently and in a timely matter.
Cr Andrew Noone said it was a two-way conversation, which was the fairest way to do it.
Ms Calvert said council staff were always looking at what was happening around consents. Every now and again having a deep dive was a good thing to do, she said.
A group made up of water users, councillors and staff was to be brought together to make best practice for irrigation.
A working group would be established to manage effective rabbit control processes. Cr Andrew Noone said rabbit control had been a focus of the council and landowners and it would be good to bring them together.
There would be an urgent review of lagarosiphon around the current opportunities - and the cost - to eliminate it. Funding options on how to do this would also be looked at. Controlling wilding pines would also be a priority along with input from central government and landowners who were causing the problem.
It was hoped to have all catchment management plans carried out inside the next two years.
A group of councillors and staff would be formed to work with Manuherikia River users to try to eliminate as many barriers as possible as the proposed Falls Dam enlargement project was worked through.
It was proposed to create bus liaison groups, including bus drivers and passengers. Ms Calvert said this group would be different from a stakeholders’ group as information from bus passengers was not getting through at the moment.
Bringing in quarterly reports to the council on buses which were running late was also proposed.
The council was also wanting to continue pressure on government and seeking collaboration on school bus services so they could be made to meet Ministry of Education guidelines.
Cr Kate Wilson said she wanted to support school buses and it was good to see central government had paused changes which were affecting many rural communities.
