A new chief executive, confirmed flood-defence funding and settlement of a court case have local authorities on the West Coast dreaming of positive times ahead
It’s the icing on the cake in what’s been an unusual good-news week for West Coast councils.
The region’s civic leaders are hopeful the coast has turned a corner with confirmation in the Budget of more than $20 million to protect Westport from the Buller River.
The announcement comes in a week that’s also seen the appointment of a new chief executive at the stoush-plagued West Coast Regional Council and the settlement of a lengthy legal wrangle with Scenic Hotel Group.
The Buller District Council pitched a business case to the government last year for $56 million for flood defences and a suite of other measures to help Westport adapt to climate change after disastrous floods and mass evacuations in 2021.
Mayor Jamie Cleine says the budget allocation of $22.9 million may be less than half that amount but it’s enough to build flood walls and stop banks.
“Don’t forget Westport people will be kicking in $10 million as well through a regional rate, so we’ll have about $33 million all-up for the infrastructure.”
And some proposals in the business case including better stormwater drainage have since become the responsibility of the new regional water entity, the mayor says.
“We’d put forward other things like new building elevation rules and no-build areas, but there’s now a very active policy discussion going on about that in central government and there’ll be a national directive along those lines and stronger regulations in the Building Act.”
A sizeable chunk of the council’s funding pitch involved adaptation and managed retreat, Cleine says.
“That’s been pulled out and it’ll have to be come further down the track.
“But this initial funding gets us started with protection and we’re grateful.”
Westport’s flood defences will be built and owned by the Greymouth-based West Coast Regional Council.
Which makes this week’s selection of new chief executive Darryl Lew timely to say the least and potentially crucial according to chair Peter Haddock.
Lew started his local-government career in Southland as a hydrologist and has experience in flood control, river engineering and drainage schemes, Haddock says.
More recently he’s been in management jobs at the Department of Conservation and the Kapiti District Council.
“We had three excellent candidates on the shortlist but he was our unanimous choice.
“He gets on well with others - he’s a good people person,” Haddock says.
A useful skill, one might think, on a council that’s been riven by Westport-Greymouth factions; coups attempted and executed; and repeated clashes between its last two bosses and former chair Allan Birchfield, an old-school West Coaster with an irrepressible contempt for “Wellington” rules.
Birchfield, deposed last month after an ultimatum from outgoing chief executive Heather Mabin, fended off an attempt by Westport councillor Frank Dooley to evict him from last week’s CEO selection meeting and threatened to file a complaint with police.
It’s perhaps another sign of progress that Birchfield supported Lew’s appointment and is for now keeping his head down and declining further comment.
Team-building needed
Haddock is cautiously hopeful of a less fractious future. He’s had enough of negative headlines, he says.
“We really need to be a team, to build a strong council. There’s so much happening for us at the moment.
“We’ve got millions of dollars of government contracts on our plates but our biggest asset is our staff. We have to work together as councillors, staff, iwi and as a region.”
The funding for Westport is exciting, he says.
“The regional council will have the responsibility of designing the flood-protection scheme and contracting it out and I’m confident the money will go a long way to getting it all done and giving Westport people peace of mind.”
The more recent flooding calamities in Nelson and Hawkes Bay did have him worried, he says.
“I thought we might end up being the poor cousins here on the Coast so I’m just thankful the government has considered Westport’s needs.”
Further south, though, Franz Josef farmers on the south bank of the wild Waiho River are still in limbo, Haddock says.
They’re waiting for the government to decide whether to extend stop banks and protect them from a glacial river whose bed gets higher by the year, threatening the state highway, the only airstrip in the area and farmland.
“We have funding approved for the north bank stop banks for Franz Josef town but those guys on the other side, the dairy farmers, they contribute so much to our regional economy and they don’t know if they have a future or if they’ll be wiped out next year.”
But at least one weight’s been taken off his mind this week.
Insurance companies acting for the regional council, Westland District Council and Scenic Hotel Group have settled a long-standing court case.
The company was suing the councils for $30 million after a wing of the hotel was flooded in 2016.
The terms of the settlement are confidential, Haddock says, but he considers them reasonably favourable to the council.
Westland District Council Mayor Helen Lash is also relieved.
“It’s a relief to have that off our plate.
“And it does feel as if we turned a corner on the Coast this week with the funding for Westport and the new regional CEO.
“We can all just get on with it. Things are looking up.”
Made with the support of the Public Interest Journalism Fund
