Buller believes more detail needed on local government simplification
Buller District Council is open to exploring alternative options for simplifying local government, and its main focus continues to be solutions that work best for Buller people.
Mayor Chris Russell says any ideas of reorganising councils on the West Coast or wider region would need to have greater detail around how Buller could retain its own identity and a level of self-determination.
“In our submission to the Department of Internal Affairs, we outline our concerns. Any future system must respect the reality that Buller is not only geographically unique but socially and culturally bound by a strong sense of place, resilience, and self-determination.
“The idea of reforms might sit easily with large city councils who can absorb costs, but the initial outlay and staff time required to recreate a new entity would be prohibitive for us,” he says.
“Reform must be anchored in evidence – local, national, and international and it must be funded appropriately.”
The Buller submission outlines that from the outside it might look like adjacent West Coast councils could share amalgamated functions and potentially create one unitary authority, but the big issue not faced by other councils is the “drastic” geographical distance similar to travelling from Auckland to Wellington.
“If not acknowledged it may lead to a weakening of local democratic process,” the submission says.
“We support a reform in principle, but not reform that risks further centralisation, unfunded mandates, or dilution of our local voice.
“We have concerns that the power centre of decisions for our district being centralised, and possibly located in another district, will potentially leave our district poorer again, in influence and staff capacity and capabilities via centralisation.”
Buller does not agree with the Combined Territories Board concept, saying it is “untenable” to think that it would be able to accommodate the workload of not only governing all aspects of Regional Council activities but also to enact and enable a Regional Reorganisation Plan to be created while serving as Mayors to different districts.
Buller’s suggestion is to look at the Mayors, Chairs and Iwi forum as being a vehicle to work on regional reorganisation plans – with further support from the Deputy Mayor and one further Councillor working alongside Regional Councillors.
“It’s in all our best interests to work with Central and Local Government partners to assess options, whilst working alongside our communities to ensure that the ‘Best for Buller’ is front and centre of the required reforms.”
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For further information please contact:
Community Engagement Team Buller District Council
Media.Enquiries@bdc.govt.nz
Disclaimer
The information in this media release was correct at time of publication. Changes in circumstances after the time of publication may impact on the accuracy of the information.