Three years of the vitriol directed at Buller District Council is as much as a newcomer to West Coast local politics is prepared to put up with
Reefton businessman John Bougen never really meant to be a councillor.
The Dress Smart founder and investor who fell in love with the small West Coast town and made it his home seven years ago bowed out of local politics this week after one term on the Buller District Council.
It’s been a blast, he says, but three years is enough.
Reefton’s done exceptionally well in those three years, with canny advocacy from Bougen and fellow councillor Dave Hawes gaining the town millions of dollars worth of investment in its water works, swimming pool, new toilets and riverside landscaping.
But as a first-time councillor, he was unprepared for the venomous personal attacks aimed at elected representatives, himself included, by members of the public, Bougen says.
“The vitriol that comes the way of the mayor and councillors and council staff is inexcusable,” he said this week in his valedictory speech as Inangahua Community Board chair.
“I take my hat off to them all - I don’t know how they get out of bed some days, the shit they have to deal with.”
Yikes, I’m on the council!
His actual election to council was somewhat accidental, he says.
“I put my name in the hat at the last minute just in case one of our two-strong Reefton candidates was elected mayor, which was really unlikely, but then I get home and he rings to say he’s pulled out completely.”
Two hours later, Bougen - to his alarm elected unopposed as a Buller District councillor - was thrown in at the deep end of local democracy.
The veteran of countless board meetings was used to robust debate and arguing his case, so council meetings were familiar territory.
But the flak that comes with the job? Not so much.
In the first offensive, Bougen was forced to defend himself after a Code of Conduct complaint from a council contractor.
He was exonerated and the complaint dismissed but the three-month investigation took a toll, he says.
In 2020, Bougen found himself the target of local anti-vaxxers after criticising the effect they were having on the town’s businesses and tourist trade.
Among other losses, Reefton cafes were being forced to cut their hours and a hotel had lost its chef because staff refused to be vaccinated, he told the Inangahua Community Board.
“Worse still, not only have the staff gone but the employers have to pay them for four weeks to bugger off and bugger up their business,” Bougen fumed.
His remarks reported in national media sparked an instant response from government agencies keen to help Reefton weather the economic storm of Covid.
“We got $70,000 injected into the town to help out those businesses, which we may not otherwise have got. I don’t think any other town got that sort of immediate help,” Bougen says.
But his typically forthright comments also generated a more sinister response.
“There was a petition to get rid of me as a councillor, and what really hurt was that 90 people signed it.”
Bougen’s critics were rebuffed by the council and reminded that councillors are appointed and deposed at elections – not by petition.
But it’s apparent, with a little probing, that the businessman who accidentally landed up in local government is still wounded by those experiences.
“Ever since I said I wasn’t standing again, people keep coming up to me and saying, ‘Why are you stepping down? You’re doing a great job.’ And I say, ‘You could have told me that any day in the last three years - why didn’t you?’”
A thick skin helps
Bougen is not bitter about his time on council, though, and says others should not be put off by his experience.
“It’s an excellent council, a really good team, with a top CEO and mayor. We’ve had everything thrown at us from the pandemic, two major floods, all the government reforms and we’ve still managed to achieve a huge amount for Buller.”
A few “naysayers” in Westport, however, are still campaigning against the current mayor and personal attacks remain rife, he says.
“Those people need to look at what this council’s got in the way of funding for Westport by focusing on the money, who’s got it and how do we get it and working with the government.
“If you look at what Grey District and Westland councils have got, always screaming at the government, there’s no comparison with Buller.”
Buller Mayor Jamie Cleine says he’s sorry Bougen is bailing.
“It’s been great to have someone with his business acumen on council. It’s been incredibly useful for us.
“But it’s true, if you’re doing a good job people see no need to tell you, and you always get the noisy minority with unrealistic expectations. But you just have to remember you’re there for the silent majority.”
And it doesn’t hurt to have a thick skin, the Buller mayor says.
Bougen says he’ll now refocusing on his Reefton businesses, building houses for an expected influx of Federation Mining staff and encouraging others to do the same.
It will be nice, he says, not to have to spend weekends in the office wading through 600-page council agendas.
Made with the support of the Public Interest Journalism Fund
