Viewpoint – Getting to work

By Greg Sayers, Rodney Councillor

It is a great honour to be entrusted as your Councillor for the next three years. As your elected representative I will work hard to provide the leadership and the strong voice required to promote our beautiful region and to deliver results. However, there are challenges ahead and I am focused on finding solutions that will allow us to develop our infrastructure and services in step with our population growth, while protecting what we already value.

To achieve this, my first order of business is to build powerful alliances with the Rodney Local Board, my fellow Councillors, Council’s leadership team and our local members of Parliament to ensure Rodney has a united approach into Council.

By placing people, ratepayer groups, the business associations and community groups at the centre of the equation, collectively we will achieve great things. Building a modern Auckland that is realistic about what it can and cannot afford will continue to be a challenge.

I had my first meeting with the Mayor, who is the most influential figure to assist Rodney. Mayor Goff explained he was keen to improve Council’s performance within Rodney and was equally keen to cap any future rate increases to an average of 2.5 per cent. In return, I made it known that if the Council was really serious about equality across the city, then Rodney required its public transport, road sealing and maintenance, public amenities and facilities to be comparable with the rest of Auckland. I also emphasised that Wellsford’s fresh water and wastewater systems had been neglected for too long and a serious investment for this town was required urgently. Growth was the big topic and having a Structure Plan in place to deliver infrastructure ahead of population growth made sense to both of us.

The meeting included our community’s desire for greater financial accountability and transparency to stop Council’s wastage and overspending and for local rates to be spent locally. I also pitched for a reduction in unnecessary Council regulations and rules, along with allowing local contracts to be sought by local contractors. The Mayor agreed with me that giving Local Board’s more decision-making power was also important.

The actual delivery on any of this will be dependent upon the next investment budget which the Mayor will construct after listening to all of the Councillors, all of the local boards and the wider Auckland community next year.

Getting straight into it, my first week also included a meeting with the Warkworth business association One Warkworth, the Fix Hill Street Now action team and MP Mark Mitchell about advancing a solution for Hill Street.