Nominations for the council and community board closed last Friday and the council will only be contested in two wards with more seats than candidates in the Mataura Community Board.
Those moving on say there are too many barriers for potential candidates, the system does not suit candidates and stress levels are unacceptable.
Deputy mayor Keith Hovell, Glenys Dickson, Richard McPhail and Bronwyn Reid stepped away and declined to run again, with a variety of reasons given.
Mrs Reid, who served on the council for three terms including a stint as deputy mayor in her second term, said people who she thought would be good candidates had said no.
"I know one or two good [potential] candidates who have said ‘no, the reading would just turn me off’," she said.
Another aspect was the continued access and criticism of councillors, with Mrs Reid pointing out examples where individuals have taken it a step too far.
"The criticism is something too. I probably don’t have a thick enough skin any more. There’s a sort of casual disrespect.
"Are we easy targets? Are we the low-hanging fruit?" she said.
Mr McPhail echoed these sentiments, and said as the job was getting harder, so too was it hard to convince some to sacrifice for the position.
"I don’t think the system caters for the right candidates sometimes," he said.
The other side of it was the stress put on to councillors, which Mr McPhail said he saw firsthand during his two terms.
"I was worried about some of the councillors’ stress during [2022]. I thought the stress the community was putting on them was inappropriate," he said.
"They didn’t sign up for it, they probably didn’t deserve it either. I was concerned about the toll it was taking on members, and the council staff, it wasn’t fair on them either."
The council had been outspoken recently about certain members of the community, calling out relentless criticism and harassment on social media.
Notably two candidates with strong ties to the group, Gary McIntyre and Donna Bruce, are running for seats in the upcoming election.
Deputy mayor Keith Hovell, speaking to The Ensign earlier in the year, also decried disruptive and nasty rhetoric from the community to councillors.
Four nominations have been received for five spots for the Mataura Community Board, however if Steven "Boko" Dixon, who is also running for council, gets on the council, he will have to give up his spot on the board.
A by-election will have to be undertaken to fill the vacancies, with one confirmed and a second potential empty seat on the board.
