Extraordinary Meeting of the Hawke's Bay Regional Council
Date: 21 May 2025
Time: 9.00am
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Venue: |
Council Chamber Hawke's Bay Regional Council 159 Dalton Street NAPIER |
Agenda
Item Title Page
1. Welcome/Karakia/Apologies/Notices
2. Conflict of interest declarations
3. Confirmation of Minutes of the Hawke's Bay Regional Council meeting held on 30 April 2025
21 May 2025
Subject: Hearing of submissions on our Annual Plan 2025-2026
Reason for report
1. This item provides the Council with:
1.1. an outline of the consultation process
1.2. the Hearing Schedule (Attachment 1)
1.3. an index of submissions and the complete set of submissions received on the Annual Plan 2025-26 consultation (Attachment 2)
1.4. public comments on HBRC’s Facebook posts (Attachment 3).
Staff recommendation
2. Staff recommend that the Council reads and considers the submissions and social media feedback in preparation for the Hearing on 21 May 2025 and to inform its decision-making at the Annual Plan 2025-26 deliberations on 28 May 2025.
3. Analysis of and staff responses to the submissions will be made available prior to Deliberations.
Background
4. As part of the Annual Plan 2025-26 consultation, Regional Council consulted concurrently on the Draft Hawke’s Bay Regional Public Transport Plan 2025-2035, and changes to the Rates Remission and Postponement Policies, and the Revenue and Financing Policy.
5. At its meeting on 26 March 2025, the Regional Council adopted for consultation all the supporting information for the concurrent consultations and the consultation document, entitled ‘Our resilience-focused Annual Plan 2025-26’.
6. The consultation document, supporting information including the Draft Hawke’s Bay Regional Public Transport Plan 2025-2035 (RPTP) was the culmination of many months of work by councillors, the Regional Transport Committee, and staff.
7. The Regional Transport Committee is holding its own Hearings and Deliberation meetings for specific feedback to the RPTP. Hearings were on 16 May 2025 and Deliberations are to be held on 6 June 2025.
8. The public consultation process ran for five weeks, from 31 March to 2 May 2025.
9. The consultation was part of Regional Council’s broader cross-council engagement plan for 2025 and was fit-for-purpose. The intention was to keep space for the bigger conversations, such as reimagining flood resilience.
10. The Transport team undertook further consultation on the Draft RPTP 2025-2035. This included a range of targeted engagements with users, communities, and stakeholders to create awareness of the RPTP, engage people with the planned route changes, and encourage submissions.
11. The Transport team also used Remix to gain further insights. Remix is a transport planning software tool that allows users to see the planned routes in detail, drop a pin in a specific place and leave detailed feedback.
12. The Annual Plan consultation document, Draft RPTP 2025-2035, other supporting information, and the submission form was available to the public online on our new Engagement Hub and available at our main office on Dalton Street, Napier. People could either fill out the form online or print out a copy to fill in.
13. The consultation document, Draft RPTP 2025-2035, and printed copies of the submission form were also available at our Wairoa office and community libraries.
14. We sent targeted letters (1,150) to ratepayers most affected by changes to the Passenger Transport targeted rate, Upper Tukituki Flood Resilience Scheme targeted rate, and the new rate for flood resilience work to Mangarau Stream.
15. The consultation was advertised through:
15.1. five print advertisements in Hawke’s Bay Today and one in The Wairoa Star
15.2. digital advertisements (a mixture of targeted ads, banners, and promoted posts) geotargeted to Hawke’s Bay with Stuff.co.nz, New Zealand Herald, Hawke’s Bay Today and Bay Buzz online
15.3. one Facebook advertisement (as below).
16. Regional Council’s social media channels (Facebook and Instagram) delivered four posts, one advertisement, and one Facebook Live session resulting in:
16.1. total reach (content seen): 102,355 (of that 79,254 reach was from paid advertising)
16.2. 82 engagement (interactions) from organic posts
16.3. 543 clicks.
17. Social media posts and public comments on Regional Council’s Facebook page are included in Attachment 3.
18. Promotion on Regional Council’s website captured more than 3880 views, 1130 users, with the average session view being four minutes. The 'Online submission form' was the most viewed page after the main page, with the 'Rates Calculator' following close behind.
Submissions
19. A total of 99 submissions were received on the combined consultation. Of those, 64 provided feedback on the Annual Plan-specific questions.
20. The written submissions are contained in Attachment 2.
21. The following graph shows the distribution of submissions by area.
Verbal submissions
22. The Hearing is scheduled to start at 9am on Wednesday 21 May 2025. It will be held in the Council Chamber, 159 Dalton Street, Napier.
23. Three submitters are scheduled to speak to their submission as set out in Attachment 1. As with all our corporate planning Hearings, the speaker has been allocated 10 minutes which includes time for councillors’ questions.
Next steps
24. After the Hearing, staff will finalise the deliberation reports for the Council to consider at its meeting on 28 May 2025.
25. There will be six deliberation reports for the Council to consider:
25.1. an introduction paper
25.2. Setting a targeted rate for flood resilience work for Mangarau Stream
25.3. Amending the Passenger Transport rate
25.4. Amending the Upper Tukituki Flood Resilience Scheme rate
25.5. Other feedback
25.6. Consolidated Annual Plan decisions, drawing together all the provisional resolutions in the above reports.
26. At this meeting, the Council will be asked to consider the submission points and responses made by staff, and to agree or not agree to the proposal as consulted on, or as requested in a submission.
27. The Annual Plan is scheduled to be adopted at a Regional Council meeting on 25 June 2025, once the plan has been updated to give effect to the resolutions made on each topic during the Deliberations on 28 May 2025. Following its adoption, Council will pass a resolution to set the rates for 2025-26.
28. At the Deliberations of the Regional Public Transport Plan 2025-2035 on 6 June 2025, the Regional Transport Committee will recommend Regional Council adopt the Public Transport Plan at the same meeting it adopts the Annual Plan 2025-26.
29. Following the adoption of the Annual Plan and the Regional Public Transport Plan, each submitter will receive an email from the Council within 30 days, setting out Council's decisions and resolutions pertinent to their submission.
Decision-making process
30. Staff have assessed the requirements of the Local Government Act 2002 in relation to this item and have concluded that, as this report is for information only, the decision-making provisions do not apply.
That Hawke’s Bay Regional Council:
1. Receives and considers the Hearing of submissions on our Annual Plan 2025-26 staff report
2. Receives and considers the written and verbal submissions, and social media feedback received on ‘Our resilience-focused Annual Plan 2025-26’.
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Mandy Sharpe Senior Corporate Planner |
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Approved by:
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Desiree Cull Strategy & Governance Manager |
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1⇩ |
21 May 2025 Hearing Schedule |
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Annual Plan 2025-26 Submissions Report |
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Under Separate Cover available online only |
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Public comments on HBRC's Facebook posts |
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Under Separate Cover available online only |
