A super-capital
The Dom Post reports:
Ratepayers in the Wellington region will be asked whether there should be a single council after Auckland was transformed into a super-city of 1.4 million people.
Wellington mayors say it is now inevitable that local government in the region will have to change, but are promising to consult widely before deciding whether to take the same route as Auckland.
I am very much in favour of Wellington going down a similar path. Five Councils on this side of the Rimutakas, three on the other side plus a Regional Council is far too much.
Like Auckland we have failed to make progress on issues like Transmission Gully because the nine Mayors could never agree.
I also think it would be great to get a range of local boards, smaller than the current Councils. An inner city local board that would include the CBD, Thorndon and Mt Victoria would, for example, be much more in tune with our issues.
Fears have been raised that the Wellington region which has a combined population of about 450,000 spread across eight local authorities and other centres will be swamped by Auckland and left behind.
Wellington Mayor Kerry Prendergast said governance changes in the Wellington region were now inevitable, though they would develop more slowly than in Auckland.
“We would rather have the consultation with our community and then take a proposal to the prime minister and say, `This is what our community wants, would you enact legislation and make it happen?”‘
Any changes could take effect at the 2013 local body elections, she said.
It will probably be an issue for Mayoral candidates at the next election. Could be worth setting up a ticket across the region of people who will push for amalgamation.
September 18th, 2009 at 8:36 am
Anything to get rid of the stupid Sister-City relationship Lower Hutt with Tempe, Arizona and Minoh, Japan would be good. These things cost the rates of every house in my street.
September 18th, 2009 at 8:53 am
I am extremely skeptical of the idea that one big council will be more ‘efficient’ than a bunch of small ones. For every one useful ‘issue they make progress on’ there will be ten other useless ones that just waste our money. I hope they wait and see how it works out in Auckland before trying to change anything in Wellington.
September 18th, 2009 at 8:56 am
The Auckland reorganisation in the late 1980’s involved destroying a lot of small “community” councils – Newmarket Mt Roskill etc etc in favour of 4 bickering Mayors with big egos. Now that is gone and maybe the “Auckland” model will serve as a blue-print for the future for local Government.
September 18th, 2009 at 9:01 am
I dont think an urban area of sub 500,000 people is a “super-city”. Maybe “decent sized suburb”?
@ Brian – there should be a provision of the Local Government Act expressly forbidding any local body forming a “sister city” relationship – what a recipe for waste and junkets.
September 18th, 2009 at 9:02 am
Auckland has something like 29 sister cities between the different Councils. I suspect the new Council will have a handful only which is a plus.
September 18th, 2009 at 9:11 am
31 sister cities, friendship cities and strategic alliances for the whole region. It is likely that rather than having any official divorces from other cities, there will be a rationalising of sister cities so we have one per country (the protocol), and the rest become friendship cities that remain on the books, but do not get serviced (as happens with some FCs right now).
There are some rather bizarre examples of sister/friendship cities in the Auckland region. It turns out that Rodney District Council inherited a number of relationships from the old Warkworth District Council. They apparently would scour the earth looking for other places called Warkworth. No focus on economic development, prospects for cultural or education enhancement, or exchanging civic ideas. They just shared the name. No joke either.
Cr Aaron Bhatnagar
September 18th, 2009 at 9:31 am
The demise of the KCDC is now inevitable.
About bloody time.
September 18th, 2009 at 9:37 am
I’m not sure they can go slower than Auckland, as Prendegast stated. In Auckland, the matter of local body amalgamation has been around since the dawn of time. It takes a Rodney to pick it up and run with it.
September 18th, 2009 at 9:55 am
I agree there seem to be too many councils in the Wellington region and am inclined towards a merger. However there are many significant differences between the Auckland and Wellington situations so let’s not assume the Auckland Big Bang approach would be right for the Wellington region. For a start there is already a lot more collaboration between the Wellington councils and joint endeavours to share more services – that goes some way towards the argument for amalgamation. Unlike Auckland, where the main CBD is at the geographical hub of the region, the Wellington CBD is at the southern extreme of our region and so is arguably more “remote” to the interests of say the Kapiti Coast or Upper Hutt (let alone the Wairarapa, which I suspect would not be included in our semi-super-city). Of course Wellington City is the largest district in the region and would be the leader in a merger, but possibly more than in Auckland there would need to be caution that their dominance doesn’t mean there would be a simplistic takeover, at the expense of the positive features of outlying districts. We couldn’t allow all facilities and services to be located just in the Wellington CBD, thus gutting the life of distant districts. We all have things to contribute to any amalgamation and we all must be treated equally.
For example, Porirua City (where I am a councillor) has won numerous awards for excellence, including last week our winning the Supreme Award at the annual NZ Post Local Govt Excellence Awards (topping 44 entries from councils around the country). We won for our “Village Planning Programme” which we believe to be unique in NZ in the way it allows local communities to develop plans for their own neighbourhoods and then work with council and other agencies to see them through. I suggest this initiative and experience is something we could well offer and lead in expansion across the region – as long as there were not a blinkered approach that all districts must follow only the WCC approach to things.
I’m also concerned that the Porirua Harbour and Pauatahanui Inlet – jewels in our crown – might well get lesser attention from an amalgamated council. We’d have to ensure special protection of that too. Other outlying districts in the region would all also have special features they would rightly insist on being treated specially.
By all means let’s have the various councils continue to talk and work together and let’s see if we can set the agenda ourselves for any possible amalgamation. I really don’t think there is the same necessity for urgency as there apparently was in Auckland and I’m sure we can learn from their experience and achieve the best outcome for the Wellington region (whatever that may be).
Cr Tim Sheppard (PCC)
September 18th, 2009 at 10:13 am
Kiwigreg.,
This forced merger of cities into the Auckland Council is the largest amalgamation in recent times.
Wendell Cox of Demographia has advised the Centre that no city in the western world, with a population of over one million people, is governed by a single council. Brisbane is near the same size but is still only half of the metropolitan area.
The mega mergers of Toronto and Ottawa have been a failure and Toronto was de-merged after only a few years.
Wendell Cox has reported on this amalgamation, and his story in the Canadian Financial Post, titled Megacity Fallout,[11] concludes:
“Finally, things are going from bad to worse. The city faces a projected budget deficit for the current fiscal year that is almost twice the Harris government’s phony $300-million savings. None of this is to deny that municipal amalgamations can produce economies of scale. They do – though they are limited to the impact upon special interests. As city hall is moved farther away, voters have less control over what goes on. Moneyed interests find larger governments more accessible and thus more susceptible to their influence. This is not just Toronto; it is anywhere that human nature operates. The experience of large municipal amalgamations is clear. Toronto is just one of the more recent examples. Municipal amalgamations are virtually always sold on the basis of saving money. They virtually never do.”
Wendell Cox has found that such municipal amalgamations rarely work. In his frequently cited article “The Toronto Megacity 10 Years Later – financial woes exacerbated by municipal amalgamation” he observes that after ten years of amalgamation, the predictions of major efficiencies did not eventuate, costs have increased, rates have risen, and Toronto now accounts for only 5 percent of the metro area’s growth compared with 30 percent before amalgamation.
Our Royal Commission proposes Toronto as a model for Auckland.
This is remarkable given the failing economic performance of Toronto since the amalgamation. In the same article Wendell Cox reports:
“Meanwhile, there is no point in arguing that amalgamation made Toronto more competitive. Despite the impressive residential development in the core, Toronto’s growth rate has become anemic. Between 2001 and 2006, the first full census period after amalgamation, the city accounted for only 5% of the metropolitan area’s population growth. In the period immediately preceding amalgamation (1991-1996), the city-to-be accounted for 30% of the growth – six times that of the more recent period.”
Can Auckland really afford to take that risk?
Similarly, the amalgamation of Winnipeg, where 13 smaller municipalities were merged into one ‘Unicity’ is hardly encouraging. As local government expert David Barber describes:
“The evidence shows the policy there to have been an abject failure. The result is a deadly mix of high taxes, high debts and unresponsive government, all factors which helped contribute to that centre’s relative decline against other cities, falling from third largest city in the late 1960s to the eighth largest today.”
So before Wellington rushes into a mega merger they might like to watch what happens in Auckland. It might have reversed the whole thing in a few years time.
Note: if you can’t agree on a transport network its not because you have too many councils – they should not be involved. It means your infrastructure agency has insufficient power.
You might like to read my submission to the select committee at:
http://www.rmastudies.org.nz/issues/53-other/367-submission-to-auckland-governance-committee
September 18th, 2009 at 10:24 am
Such a merger will not make Wellington a city. It will remain a overgrown village.
if it weren’t for some inexplicable reason to make it the seat of government, Wellington would merely be the northern terminus of the Cook Strait ferries. A North Island Picton if you must.
September 18th, 2009 at 10:26 am
I am at a loss as to why such a thing is important for Wellington.
Auckland is Auckland, the engine room and number one place in the Country, whereas Wellington is just another small provincial town like Westport or Bluff…(Albert Park with a couple of tall buildings, is how I generally think of the Capital)
If we are going to have a Super City it should be confined to areas populated by ‘Adults’ (rather than yokels) and where there are sufficient people to justify the word ‘Super’; next we will have an Oamaru/Kurow/Twizel “Super City”…
September 18th, 2009 at 10:29 am
I am not sure that an amalgamation between the WCC and other councils would be in the best interests of anyone except the Wellington ratepayers (whose council will be bailed out by the fiscally responsible ones from other districts).
There are a lot of issues getting plans through the WCC for issue of building consent, as the WCC is very picky (they are the only council that require the temperature control valve on the hot water cylinder to be marked on the plans, for example) and will just come up with new rules seemingly overnight. No other councils in the region are like that – KCDC is not so pedantic, but they have recently changed the district plan to force all new home builders to include an 11,500l water tank to run the toilets and outside taps off, rationed at 600l/day (and what is going to happen when it is empty? It will be filled up from an inside tap of course). But it is definitely preferable to the Wellington way of doing things.
It will end up with the We
Also, what about the case of Otaki? It could be included in the Wellington Super City by default, because it in the KCDC. It would be far better served by being part of the Horowhenua (or if we are taking this to extremes, Palmerston North) council, not the WCC.
September 18th, 2009 at 10:34 am
oops.
Mark my words, the proposed Wellington merger will not be good for the other districts and it is doubtful if it will be good for Wellington City
September 18th, 2009 at 10:35 am
There might well be a case for ‘efficiency’ in turning Wellington and the other councils into one entity, and Christchurch and Canterbury councils into one, but …
I think we would lose an accessibility to our local government representatives. In a town where I grew up the mayor was a shopkeeper. You could talk to him pretty much any time of the day.
Another time, another town, and I was new, I was despatched to an address to see the mayor. It was a garage and car dealership. I asked at the office to see him, expecting to be ushered into the boss’s sanctum. The receptionist pointed me to the workshop, where I found the mayor, the firm’s chief mechanic, underneath a jacked-up Vauxhall Velox. We conducted the interview while he was on his back on one of those little trolleys and he was swearing and sweating with spanners and wrenches and a screwdriver — but as mayor he gave good, clear, concise answers to my questions. I think that he would have regarded PR and spin as beneath him.
September 18th, 2009 at 10:45 am
All these little things add up. In the Hutt, a $100,000 is about 20-25 houses worth of total rates. Rodney needs to change the laws so that core council functions are defined and everything else is chopped – unless locals specifically vote to keep it.
September 18th, 2009 at 11:15 am
Agree Brian. Amalgamation without limitation of powers is a recipe for disaster. Local Government has shown if they can spend it, they will.
September 18th, 2009 at 11:23 am
A Wellington super-city? Aren’t we getting ahead of ourselves? Let’s see how the Auckland experiment goes first.
All the talk above about sister city junkets and waste. Is this stuff going to be easier or harder to control in a super-council? I think it will be harder. We’ll have a mayor who’s paid more than the PM, who will appoint himself some Ministers of Economic Development etc and spend a fortune running around studying the rest of the world and making busy work.
I like the idea of economies of scales etc, but unless the remit of these super-councils is tightly defined, we’ll just end up with multiple governments.
September 18th, 2009 at 11:28 am
@ Owen McShane The point is it SHOULD work. Bad execution doesn’t necessarilly mean the policy is bad, just that we end up with a bunch of fucktards running councils
September 18th, 2009 at 12:12 pm
But when so many mega mergers have failed so badly surely it is prudent to assume there may be a systemic problem – or are we convinced that Auckland can guarantee the Super City will be staffed and led by Super Beings.
As it happens the evidence from the UK US and Canada is that mega mergers lead to dominance by the left.
Remember Red Ted – first Mayor of the Greater London Council.
Les Brown and Mike Lee will almost certainly be the Mayor and Deputy Mayor of Auckland. The transition agency is already being dominated by lefties. We seem to be following the trend.
September 18th, 2009 at 12:36 pm
Brisbane City (mayor Newman is from the libs) seems to work, and stuff gets done there – they have a state government that is prepared to spend on infrastructure (and a Labor one at that). The Gold Coast City Council seems to do quite a bit better than Brisbane though – it doesn’t have anywhere near the traffic problems of Brisbane (perhaps because much of the growth is post-WW2) but still appears like an old boys club at times (such as exempting the Surfer’s Paradise Hilton from the development charges that everyone else has to pay).
Brisbane City was also set up in the 1920s, so people have had a long time to get used to how stuff works there. The downside is that the city is so big, if anyone needs access to officials you are pretty much guaranteed to talk to someone down the pecking order. Ditto for GCCC.
Incidentally, the Brisbane City Council turns over more revenue than the state of Tasmania.
My thoughts are that Queensland cities would just get on with building stuff even if they were more fragmented than they are. One only has to look at the Tugun Bypass debacle (Queensland paid for a road built partly in NSW after the NSW government refused to help fund it, and the NSW government had the cheek to ask for stamp duty for the land) to know that politics won’t get in the way of a good infrastructure project.
September 18th, 2009 at 12:48 pm
Nice to hear a council reps view, thanks Northern.
In principle I am in favour of one main council for Wellington, Porirua and the two Hutt cities, but and it’s a big but, apart from Upper Hutt city where I live, it seems that most of the local councils are run by munters arguing about their own pet projects.
Wellington city councils Rob Goulden is not able to work with anybody at times, and Lower Hutt council struggles to be able to deal with the sea side suburb of Eastbourne being two obvious sore points.
Also Porirua has very wealthy areas right next to low income areas and because of voting being based on populations not on households, we see rates based more on capital values and not flat household charges. (Feel free to correct me if I’m wrong). In effect the high value homes subsidises the low value homes for rates services.
Upper Hutt isn’t perfect, but it focuses more on the bread and butter and the ratepayers are happy with the council. To prove the fact, they’ve had two mayors in the last 20-30 years.
So why would Porirua, Kapiti or Upper Hutt want to join the disfunctional population heavy weights Lower Hutt and Wellington City council and lose basically well run local services to fund the whims of Wellington CC and Lower Hutt CC???
I look to Auckland to see how that goes in the meantime.
September 18th, 2009 at 12:49 pm
Queensland has had the good sense to reject Smart Growth and other planning theologies.
Unfortunately the whole logic behind the Super City is to promote Smart Growth. At the meeting at Matakana on Saturday the ARC folk were all quite clear that Rodney District had to be inside Auckland Council so that the Council could stop people leaving Auckland to live in Rodney Kaipara because of the attraction of low development contributions and hence low house prices etc.
The Berlin Wall has to be far enough out to stop people living where they want.
September 18th, 2009 at 1:08 pm
You are quite right Owen. The problem is that people will just go even further out (you will see Auckland commuters living at Huntly) and this will only add to the traffic problem. If the governance is bad for a long time, Auckland will lose out as business will start to steer clear and choose other centres such as Hamilton, Christchurch or (dare I say it) Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane or the Gold Coast as their New Zealand base.
I fear that the Auckland Super City with its Super Mayor will just end up dysfunctional, and any attempt to set one up in Wellington will end up exactly the same.
September 18th, 2009 at 1:15 pm
The key to a successful Greater Wellington will be how the local structures are set up and adminstered. I can’t see the Wairapapa people accepting local boards with no property and employees like in Auckland’s proposed structure.
September 18th, 2009 at 2:37 pm
David Farrar (1189) Vote: 3 0 Says:
September 18th, 2009 at 9:02 am
Auckland has something like 29 sister cities between the different Councils. I suspect the new Council will have a handful only which is a plus.
No. By my reckoning, that’s a minus.
September 18th, 2009 at 3:22 pm
A couple of trolls have knuckled their way down from Auckland onto the thread today I see.
Stig and Capitalist, your denigration of smaller places than Auckland is laughable – Auckland is smaller than such well known cosmpolitan metropolises as Heze, Guarulhos, Nizhny Novgorod, Palembang, Bursa, Tijuana…
September 18th, 2009 at 3:28 pm
Not that I’m dissing Auckland, it’s got plenty going for it. But guys, you’re just not *that* special.
September 18th, 2009 at 3:29 pm
I’d be much happier if Wellington tried it first. Less to fuck up, and the people pulling the strings also have to live with the mistakes.
September 18th, 2009 at 3:37 pm
Great post by Owen McShane at 12.49…
Bit like company amalgamations, Owen. Sometimes they work, even for a long time, like General Motors, but more often it’s just papering over the cracks.
Lefties love committees, inquiries, commissions, mergers, restructuring, piling plans upon plans upon plans … in other words their heaven comprises perpetual chatter.
Oh well, if a large leftist organisation ends up running Auckland, with another running Wellington, it might become time for South Island-Aoraki to consider seeking entry into Australia as a state. Better than being part of a declining, South Pacific version of Belarus or Cuba.
September 18th, 2009 at 3:43 pm
“next we will have an Oamaru/Kurow/Twizel “Super City”…”
Already have, the largest city (in land area) in the country comprising Port Chalmers, Portobello, Waitati, Waikouaiti, Karitane, Mosgiel, Brighton, Outram, Middlemarch and a few smaller places as well. Don’t know if the new Auckland will be bigger or not.
September 18th, 2009 at 3:52 pm
I can’t see how having a massive council could ever be anything other than left wing. And the funny thing is I’m moderately left wing myself and I still don’t like the idea.
September 18th, 2009 at 3:58 pm
Heh at least with Auckland, it will be fucked up properly and nobody will dare to touch the rest of the country!
September 18th, 2009 at 4:49 pm
Northern/Tim, From a Dom post article earlier this year I recall the “jewels in our crown” aren’t in great condition as it is. Otherwise yes, I agree with the sentiment that those of us out of Wellington City would be in danger of being marginalised.
September 19th, 2009 at 8:17 pm
Upper Hutt is run by the Mick Mafia isn’t it? Sooner the whole bloody lot is amalgamated the better and we can sack most of the useless time-servers that occupy the Hutt City building. Pity the major earthquake has just been put back 200 years. Might have got most of the bastards before they got round to wasting 40 mill on a new palace for them.
September 19th, 2009 at 9:10 pm
As others have said, the problem with any amalgamation is the risk that all the spending, events, facilities, get moved south to the Wellington CBD, leaving Upper City (where I live) nothing more than a domicile city. With barely any facilities, and given the WCC’s “spending tendencies” higher rates.
As others have mentioned, UHCC is effeciently run focusing on the key functions of a council, in buildings with genuine 1970’s styling. At the last election no one, bar the usual joke candidate, stood against the incumbant mayor Wayne Guppy.
The simple reality is that for some of the other cities in the region an amalgamation is nothing more than a case of less for more, and there is likely to be little to any support from some the outer cities.