Council reporting project ends

Regular readers of this paper will have noticed that over the past three years, we have run many Auckland Council stories written by journalist Laura Kvisgstad.

Laura’s position was funded by NZ On Air and involved a collaborative approach by local and regional news organisations, who did not have the resources to have a dedicated Auckland Council reporter.

It started in January 2022 with a two-year grant from NZ On Air and was extended for 12 months last year. The project has now finished and its demise will create a void that will be difficult to fill.
When our local councils were absorbed into the Supercity, the tyranny of distance removed our ability to sit in the chambers, hear debates first-hand and discuss the issues with councillors and staff.

Although we still cover the Rodney Local Board, few regional papers can spare a reporter for a whole day to travel to the city to cover the rest of council.

Therefore, it made sense to collaborate with and hire one reporter to cover council for multiple publications. This meant ratepayers could continue to see how decisions that affected their communities were being made and, particularly, how their local councillors were performing.

Laura’s ability to quote the debates in the chamber, so readers could see the views expressed by their council representatives, made these councillors accountable. Her departure will mean there will be a lot less scrutiny of councillors and council decisions.

It was unfortunate that politicians such as Winston Peters chose to politicise the funding, likening it to a bribe. Nothing could be further from the truth. NZ On Air took a hands-off approach, while still requiring us to be accountable for the funds.

We will do our best to cover council meetings online in future, but it will be impossible to replicate the same depth of coverage. Over the past three years, Laura reported on the Governing Body, its committees, Council Controlled Organisations (CCOs), advisory panels and the Hauraki Gulf Forum.

Many of the stories she produced would never have seen the light of day without her coverage.

At the start of the project, our papers were reaching more than 130,000 homes and businesses in the wider Auckland area, as well as our online readerships. That’s a lot of ratepayers who will now be less informed.

A particular benefit of the project was the opportunity to provide readers with an iwi perspective, which had been almost absent from local authority reporting.

Laura looked for stories with a Māori impact focus and stories that raised the voices of mana whenua/mātāwaka at council. She did this by looking at issues raised by the Independent Māori Statutory Board (IMSB), council’s Māori impact statements and council aligned organisations discussing issues linked to mana whenua.