The Taranaki Daily News hosted an event with the Mayoral Candidates on 25th September. There were some interesting comments made on the night.

Last Thursday, 25th September, the Taranaki Daily News hosted an event with the Mayoral Candidates.

They did a great job, did some good research on the candidates, and asked some great questions. There was a bit of humour thrown in - and a bit of jeering here and there from the crowd – from both sides.

Sarah Lucas mentioned she was keen on bringing in Citizen Assemblies if successful, the Alliance are not keen on those - and will explain about how those are working overseas - if Sarah is successful.

Sarah was also keen on bringing in rates based on Capital Value of property – which we believe would just push up rates for some even more.

There was talk about rates caps and rate curbs – the same but somehow different. Sam Bennett mentioned the scorched earth version of rates caps – based on NSW in Australia – with no explanation of what scorched earth meant. We don’t think he was meaning a drought.

David Bublitz explained how all the millions of costs and borrowing only adds 1% to rates – and that it is not right for the community to talk about reducing operating costs.

Many of the community in the audience let him know they did not agree with those thoughts.

John Woodward talked of announcing his “financial plan” for New Plymouth at 9am on the 26^th September, many have heard of this plan but not seen it. John has since released a plan run by a NZ Company, who appears to have done great work with around 14 NZ Businesses. They pride themselves on not reducing any staff numbers but running more efficiently.

A number of current sitting Councillors running for Mayor had an earlier discussion on the night - that the NPDC is not a business - and runs on governance, and legislation, not a business model.

There was talk of the Murray Chong Never Wrong award – we’re not quite sure what that is – but it sounded quite catchy.

Max Brough talked about reviewing projects and getting a handle on costs – we never heard the word “axe” mentioned in regard to existing projects – like the RNZ reporter seemed to hear.

There was talk of Community Engagement Surveys where the NPDC has gone out into the community to meet the people who feel more safe meeting on their own turf, rather than in the Council building.

We’re not quite sure who this group of people are, and it’s not good to hear they don’t feel safe meeting in a Council building, but the Ratepayers and Renters of New Plymouth are still waiting to find out when their group gets to have a special meeting forum - to see what we think about things going on at the Council.

Particularly as we are the people who are footing the bill for all the decisions being made.

The Daily News story is behind a paywall, so we have attached the RNZ story about the night here:

https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/574170/bumper-crowd-turns-up-for-new-plymouth-mayoral-debate