Partnership/Co-Governance of suburbs are planned for the City of New Plymouth. You have only 5 days left to tell the NPDC No if you don't want this
People, this is a big story, and we need you to share this with a lot of people very quickly, and for people to act very quickly, if they are not happy with this proposal.
Partnership/Co-Governance of suburbs of New Plymouth are planned for the City of New Plymouth. You have 5 days to let the NPDC know if you don’t agree with this new model for our city.
A consultation has been out since 28th July – Did any ratepayers or renters know about this ? There will be many, many people in New Plymouth that this is the first they have heard there is an open consultation.
We knew about the development of the Spatial Plan, but we were told on June 24th that a consultation had been put on hold because there are updates coming to the RMA. Yesterday buried at the bottom of a story about Waitara and Climate Adaptation we find the consultation has been very quietly put on the NPDC website with no mention to the general public that it is there.
This one consultation – if people don’t make a lot of noise to stop what is proposed – this will alter the future of how Local Government is managed in New Plymouth. The NPDC is planning to introduce a Council Bylaw which makes it possible to Co-Govern New Plymouth with IWI in all our suburbs - and pay them for that involvement.
The Waitara Spatial Pilot Plan is to be consulted on first, then Bell Block with Iwi there, then Inglewood with Iwi there and then the rest of New Plymouth.
We did an LGOIMA with the NPDC to clarify some of the concerns we had about this Partnership/Co-Governance proposal. These are our main issues: (the OIA reply is attached).
- The complete lack of transparency about this pilot model with the general public of New Plymouth. The Pilot is in Waitara but there are plans already started for other parts of New Plymouth and the public has not been told
- The additional costs that the ratepayers will be subject to with a Co-Governed model
- The secrecy around what payments the IWI and Hapu will actually be paid
- The “getting active” aspect of the plans – read cars will not be required
- If Iwi and Hapu decide what the plans look like how do the ratepayers get to develop something they want to do differently ?
If that’s all you need to know and you’d like to go straight to sending a submission to the NPDC – go to the end of this story – which tells you why to send an e-mail, or letter, submission and not do one on the NPDC website.
Following is more background to the Waitara Spatial Plan for people who would like to know more.
How many people in Waitara knew that for the last few years a plan was being developed - for all Council infrastructure decisions to be made with an NPDC, Iwi and Hapu agreement. How many people know that Iwi and Hapu will be paid for the decisions they will be involved with.
The current Waitara Community Board members have been heavily involved in developing this plan with IWI and Hapu. For the first 6 months the input into plans were mostly IWI and Hapu. Some of the community were invited to contribute but many involved have been children at schools in Waitara.
What about Ratepayers and Renters though, did they know about these plans to Co-Govern/Work in Partnership with IWI and Hapu ? Did you know about the plans or this consultation ?
Why are consultations so secret with the current NPDC ? Could that be because they know the majority of people in New Plymouth will not agree with this model for our city.
Councils across the country are looking at putting in these types of arrangements.
In case you feel you have to agree with these types of actions being introduced for our suburbs and city – because the NPDC tells you this is the RIGHT way for you to behave and AGREE with – we wanted to let you know this arrangement has been tested in NZ Court where the Judge said,
“Local authorities are not directly subject to the Treaty of Waitangi and its principles as they are not part of the Crown and thus not party to the Treaty.”
A bylaw is not a legal way to force a “Partnership/Co-Governance” arrangement on to the people living in any suburbs or cities in NZ.
Link to this Marlborough Court Case here (if you are a detail type of person):
Included with these court case findings are the “Principles of Consultation” (we have attached a copy). Consultation with the NPDC looks absolutely nothing like this for the majority of ratepayers or renters.
So, what has the Community Board in Waitara been working on with the Local Iwi and Hapu for the last few years ?
Who got to develop this plan ? Did they write to every Ratepayer in Waitara and ask them if they wanted to be involved ?
There is a picture attached from the Plan showing how IWI have engaged about the plan. There is a lot of mention of school children, there was an open day at the Marae, and a night market and not a lot of anyone else.
The planning pages for the 2 Waitara Spatial Plan documents are 167 pages long. Not too many working people at the end of their week, or after a hard day’s work, are going to get around to reading that.
There are some good questions being asked in these documents and there are some good ideas, so we’re not trying to say everything in this is not good.
We’ll try to summarise the bits we don’t think you’ll like.
There is NO mention in these documents that the NPDC Iwi Partnership means being involved with issuing permits and consents and being paid for doing that. Why is that a secret ? Why is this not being disclosed publicly and openly ? Why are the people of New Plymouth not being told Waitara is a pilot and it is planned to roll this out across the city ?
August 2024 to June 2025 – the people preparing this plan were the Iwi and Hapu with the Council. Multiple meetings were held and significant resources were supplied so these plans could be developed by only one group of the community.
The general community in Waitara had no idea this was happening behind closed doors. Iwi and Hapu are considered to be the only stakeholders for this plan.
Before July 2025 there was very limited ratepayer engagement AT ALL. And after July 2025 you would only know about it if you happened to stumble across it. This is not okay. The people paying the rates are being intentionally kept in the dark about plans that are being prepared.
We’ve been across the Devon Street West Cycleway in New Plymouth, and looking at the Green Masterplan for the Centre of Town – so we are not keen on Council plans which kill off businesses and put drivers and cyclists in harms way.
There is a lot – we mean a lot – of talk in this Waitara Spatial Plan about
- Active Travel – that means you move - the car doesn’t,
- Pedestrianising key streets – West Key, MacLean Street are examples
- Traffic Calming measures
- Accessing day to day retail by walking or cycling
- Building dedicated cycleways
- Creating accessible footpaths for walking, scooters and mobility scooters.
It all sounds nice on a piece of paper – but when you see it in action – like Devon Street West it is downright dangerous for everyone using the roads. Businesses also struggle to attract customers. You can’t fit a trolley full of groceries, or a fridge, on your push bike.
There is mention in the plan about not travelling with cars from west to east in Waitara – that is suggesting that vehicles will not be able to get from one side of town to the other. Would that mean having to drive out on to the highway to pop round to visit family on the other side of Waitara ?
There is mention of Council and Iwi working in a Partnership to build housing. Sounds great to deal with housing issues – but Partnership in the context of Iwi does not seem to mean that Iwi provide half of the money that goes in to the project, or that they take half of the risk if it fails.
Our concerns with this is Ratepayers will be underwriting a costly housing scheme - when Ratepayers across NP are already financially committed to addressing our roading, water pipes, street lights – infrastructure – and many people already are struggling to pay their rates without the extra costs associated with Co-Governance and housing.
We make the statement that Iwi and Hapu will be involved in all infrastructure decisions, deciding who can and can’t carry out an activity in Waitara through permits and consents, and they will be paid for this involvement.
We were told this verbally by the NPDC CEO Gareth Green, when we asked questions – and we also did a LGOIMA (Council OIA) to ask in writing for this to be confirmed to be true. It was. But the NPDC will not report on what payments will be made to IWI as this arrangement of payments will be made through contractor payments – so will be private information with the contractors payments.
So the Ratepayers and Renters DO NOT need to know what money changes hands ? That is appaling.
The future for all of New Plymouth, if this Pilot is not voted against through consultations, will be that the NPDC will become a “Partnership/Co-Governance” model where the ratepayers will pay IWI and Hapu to be involved in all infrastructure decisions (permits and consents), and all designs of how IWI and Hapu want the suburbs of New Plymouth to be.
It would be fairly obvious if the Iwi and Hapu have decided how they want their suburbs to look then they would not be issuing permits for anyone who wanted to do something differently.
Where does the Ratepayer, or Renter, fit in this model ? How do the people who actually pay for the NPDC to exist get to have a say on how they want their suburbs to be ?
There is a very detailed plan for the city centre called the green masterplan, which we haven’t had a chance to tell you about yet, but a lot of development work has been done on that already too. We wonder if all the actions being put in place to empty businesses out of shops in the centre of town have been in preparation of a Co-Governed Centre of town ?
If you DO NOT want this for the future for New Plymouth you must act – you must send feedback to the Council.
As the general population of New Plymouth has not been told about this consultation you have
JUST 5 DAYS to say NO - on Friday 12th September – they don’t state a closing time.
Please share this with everyone you know. And please try very hard to convince people to write to the Council – and write to individual councillors to tell them they do not support this.
It is important not to use the forms on the NPDC website – in the usual way answers are being managed by the Council to get the responses they prefer.
The very first question is - Do you live in Waitara – and it is a compulsory answer. Due to all the secrecy about this Pilot Plan, we have strong suspicions the NPDC will exclude all responses they get from people who don’t live in Waitara.
The entire New Plymouth District needs a say on this model being proposed for our city. You may have been planning to buy your first house there, or cash up and retire there. You live in the New Plymouth District and you are entitled to have your say about how our democratic decisions are made in New Plymouth.
So, if you don’t agree with these Co-Governance/Partnership plans DO NOT use the online forms – do this instead:
Write an e-mail – or - a letter you will hand deliver.
Email to: enquiries@npdc.govt.nz
It must have a Heading with the word Submission e.g
Submission for the Draft Waitara Spatial Plan.
If you don’t agree write something like:
I do not support any of the Partnership/Co-Governance model which is proposed in the Waitara Spatial Plan.
I do not want the Waitara Spatial Plan being implemented in any form.
Your name
New Plymouth District Resident**
**Do not put your address or suburb – just that you live in the NP District.
You live here, this initiative is a pilot to bring Co-Governance to all NP suburbs, and you are entitled to have your opinion about this recorded with the NPDC in a consultation. Leave your address and suburb out of the consultation so your opinion is not discarded.
Posted: Sun 07 Sep 2025