Let's Chat
Personal thoughts and observations by Andrew Dalziel, CEO, Hurunui District Council
20 August 2008
Hello everyone
With Garry on leave in India this week he has asked Hurunui District Council CEO, Andrew Dalziel to use his column to comment on the recent flooding event.
When I arrived to take up my position as CEO late last year, the District couldn’t get enough water – drought was one of the biggest issues we were all dealing with. The desire to secure access to further supplies of water to expand the District’s predominant food and fibre based economy, balanced against environmental and recreational effects will take centre stage for our Council as we develop the Long Term Plan. Residents will be asked for their views on the plan next year.
Right now water is still the biggest issue on our plate. The ‘100 year’ flooding event that happened at the end of July is nothing new for the District. There are plenty of wise old heads out there that have seen it all before and these people are not 100 years old! What is clear to me is that the existing infrastructure in parts of the District was incapable of coping with such large volumes of water. Numerous sections of road were washed out, bridge entrances scoured, property flooded – worst of all homes that were flooded above floor level.
My understanding of the plans the Council has in place for further stormwater work in the foreseeable future is that any new infrastructure we would have put in place for towns such as Amberley, wouldn’t have been able to cope with the massive volume of water that entered the area four weeks ago.
A review is now underway of our existing infrastructure, the plans we have and the aerial photos we took during the event (some of which are on display in the Amberley District Council Office) so that the Council can look at what further infrastructural work it wants to fund – this to be considered against an aging ratepayer base, many of whom are on fixed incomes.
The country as a whole suffers from inadequate infrastructure. The independent ‘Shand Rating Enquiry’ last year recommended among other things a new contestable infrastructure fund for local government funded out of GST but I gather this is unlikely to be acted on by a Labour Government.
In terms of the stormwater network we currently have, there are maintenance issues. One difficult issue is natural water courses on private land where in the past landowners have maintained these channels and kept them from fouling. Where this is not the case today and flooding results affecting others, there is a call for Council to step in. Who pays for this work? What are the legal implications? We are taking legal advice.
Some residents have said our Engineers did not respond quickly enough or were negligent. For serious misconduct to have occurred something akin to an intentional act resulting in personal injury or serious property damage would have had to have occurred. There is nothing I have sighted of this nature. From what I have seen, our staff managed the event as well as they could. For a small Council, our Emergency Management headquarters was well staffed and while there are always things we could have done better, a recent debrief with Police, Fire and Ambulance was in the main very positive. But there are always two sides to a story – as National MP Colin King was saying, this was ‘an accident waiting to happen’, his party spokesperson for local government, MP John Cater was on the phone to me appreciating the good work our engineering staff were doing to minimise the effects of the event.
The review we are undertaking will cost out possible improvements and our elected members will have to grapple with the affordability of any formal storm water programme that is settled on.
Sincerely
Andrew Dalziel
Andrew.dalziel@hurunui.govt.nz
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