Opening of Raglan papakainga a long time coming
The new buildings are stage 1 of the papakainga on the Te Kopua 2B3 land block at the newly completed Rau o te Huia Rise.
T
he opening of the papakainga in Raglan tomorrow morning marks the end of a long journey for the Te Kopua 2B3 Māori Land Incorporation. “Honestly, this project is about 50 years in the making,” says project manager Aubrey Te Kanawa, who has been working on the housing development for about 10 years. “Our original papakainga was on the old Raglan golf course but was destroyed to make way for the airstrip during World War II. A modern papakainga on Te Kopua 2B3 block was proposed back in 1993. I was in fourth form when Uncle Mana Forbes put the proposal forward,” says the 37-yearold. “However at the time there were all sorts of hurdles preventing the previous boards from executing on that vision.” These hurdles included restrictive planning rules over Māori land, a lack
of viable wastewater options, and banks not being prepared to lend for residential developments on Māori land. “You might think it’s hard to get a deposit in todays’ market, but imagine having to save the entire amount because you can’t get lending. We have had to save for close to two decades.” Tomorrow’s opening marks the completion of stage 1 of the papakainga on the Te Kopua 2B3 land block at the newly completed Rau o te Huia Rise, near the mouth of the Raglan Harbour. Stage 1 consists of a three-bedroom whānau home and two two-bedroom kaumatua homes – two of the tenants are Raglan locals and another is returning home to Raglan after many years away. Once the entire project is completed there will be seven rental properties and four ground leases for those who want to build their own houses. A central community whare is envisaged down the track. Priority for the dwellings was given
to the shareholders of the land and their descendants, and Aubrey says there was a lot of interest from whānau wanting to return to the land. “Papakainga housing is our small tribe’s response to the current housing crisis. By creating new housing stock we help alleviate the housing supply shortage in Raglan, although its true purpose for us is to reconnect people to the land and rebuild our hapu. That objective was around long before the current housing crisis began,” says Aubrey. “We collectively made a commitment to provide rental houses to our shareholders at below market prices. This is a cost our shareholders were willing to accept in order to achieve the larger objective of building the hapu.” Aubrey says there will be a bit of a pause before continuing with the next stage of the development. “There are a few conditions that need to be satisfied for the next stage to commence,” he says. “It’s quite a difficult project given the extra layers of work that comes with developing on Māori land.” With assistance of an infrastructure grant from Te Puni Kokiri, the incorporation has been able to put in its own infrastructure, such as a constructed wetland to manage storm water and a local area network for telecommunications, and it added a new pump station to the council’s wastewater system. “Infrastructure and buildings aside, the real work is just starting for us. We now have to start building the community that will become kaitiaki for the land.” A private karakia will be held over the new houses early tomorrow morning. “That will be our opportunity to thank all the people who have helped make this papakainga project possible, and for them to have a nosey.” Inger Vos
Third sewage spill from ‘unreliable’ network
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ouncil needs to stop making excuses and take ownership of Raglan’s unreliable wastewater network, says community board deputy chairman Bob MacLeod, following the latest spill of sewage into the harbour. The sewage spill, which is believed to have happened on Saturday, is the third in just four months, and once again saw Waikato District Council staff scrambling to erect signs advising people not to swim or gather shellfish in the harbour. On Monday, the council released a statement to say that staff was investigating a wastewater overflow near the Greenslade Rd pump station, which is on the foreshore of the harbour. The overflow “was the result of a localised network power outage in the area. This then caused the pump station to fail, the network to build up and wastewater to escape from a near-by manhole”, the statement said. The council would not comment further while investigations were ongoing, but Raglan councillor Clint Baddeley said it appeared a combination of factors contributed to the spill: a high tide, extreme weather conditions, a power outage and a delay in human response time. Mr MacLeod called the latest spill a completely new issue of an “unreliable network”.
“We don’t agree with the level of service provided by council.” He said the council was always coming up with excuses for the overflows, rather than looking at how to rectify problems before they happened. About two weeks ago, the community board had walked around Raglan with council staff to familiarise themselves with the wastewater system, he said. “In Greenslade Rd, here is one (pump station and manhole) right by the sea. That’s catastrophic, and they didn’t seem worried about it. ‘No, no, we have six hours of storage, if anything happens we can get a response team out here in no time’.” Mr MacLeod said it appeared council had laid pump stations and manholes on low-lying ground close to the foreshore where they were at risk of being inundated with water. “Why aren’t these sealed? ‘No, no, we wouldn’t need to seal these’. “Under health and safety, let’s seal it. I was an engineer in telecommunications, it’s easy to do. And put it down as a red flag. That should be identified as a risk. “Power has to go upstairs, you have to put it out of the way. It’s common sense.” He said council imposed all sorts of rules and regulations about building close to the water, due to global warming and rising sea levels. “Here we have a network of assets below the standards applied by council for other developments.”
Mr MacLeod said the standard line from council was that spills were the fault of customers. “They are putting things down there that they shouldn’t. “Or they put the blame on sewage people who empty septic tanks, say they open the manholes and pour stuff down there. “Why can’t they be locked? They say they can’t lock them. Seems everything you suggest to them is too hard. “They keep coming up with excuses.” Mr MacLeod said another solution was for council to fine those who were pouring storm water into the wastewater system. A council staff member had told him that that they could monitor such activity by checking flow levels, he said. “They can see who it is.” Mr MacLeod said council’s stance that the number of spills in Raglan was well within national standards was unacceptable for Raglan. “Our community has said, very strongly, that these national standards don’t fit Raglan: a spill doesn’t just include my neighbour and myself, it involves the whole town.” The Raglan Community Board has requested a report from council on the state of its wastewater system. “It will give a status on the system now, and what they are going to do in the future.” Inger Vos
BARBARA KURIGER
MP FOR TARANAKI-KING COUNTRY ELECTORATE OFFICE CONTACT: P: 07 870 1005 E: Kuriger.Teawamutu@parliament.govt.nz A: 25 Roche Street, Te Awamutu www.barbarakuriger.co.nz
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RAGLAN Chronicle 3