Despite the protests of one Waitaki district councillor, the sycamore trees will come down without a landscape plan having been put in place first.
Cr Jim Hopkins opposed the decision to remove the trees and then seek council approval for a landscape plan for the area at this month's council meeting.
''We are ... the sheriff in town,'' Cr Hopkins said. And the council, he said, needed to be seen to apply the rules it imposed on others to itself.
Others, he said, would have to provide a landscape plan before work began.
In the letter to residents, provided to the Otago Daily Times, council project manager Joshua Rendell says the council had committed to preparing a landscaping plan for the area, which would be circulated to residents for comment ''in due course''.
The council announced at the beginning of the year that following the permanent closure of Arun St it would realign a large stormwater main from the now-closed portion of Arun St to Tyne St.
The work would increase the capacity of the stormwater network in the area, but would also ''unfortunately cause significant damage'' to the roots of the trees at the edge of the Oamaru Harbour area.
In a council statement on January 9, it said the trees would be removed before the end of that month.
However, the trees received a brief reprieve from councillors caught out by the council staff's plans.
Later, at the council's assets committee meeting in early February, Waitaki Mayor Gary Kircher initially made a bid to get an agreement on landscaping for the area in place ''before work commences'', but dropped the proposed condition before it was tested in a vote.
A delay to the council's infrastructure work could delay the development of an ocean-facing 22-unit boutique luxury accommodation complex on the adjacent 6200sq m Tyne St land, council assets group manager Neil Jorgensen said.
Cr Hopkins is not on the assets committee, but was present for the debate on February 5.
At last week's council meeting he said he understood the problems created by the issue being identified ''so late in the process'', but after councillors voted down his amendment, which would have required a landscape plan being agreed to first, he was the lone vote against the decision to go ahead with the project.
Cr Melanie Tavendale said she knew the idea of removing the trees came as a surprise to councillors but she did not want to put the project on hold when a landscape plan's approval before or after the trees' removal would have the ''exact same outcome''.
''You can turn this into a media beat-up if you choose to,'' she said. ''I don't think that's fair.
''It is us making rules to stall the process.''
The council informed residents the work would begin on March 4 and was expected to take four weeks.
