Received from Christchurch Driver [CD]
Fri, 26 Aug 2016 at 9:47 p.m.
Readers, you must allow your correspondent some iced cupcakes with his Choysa tonight, go on then, the ones with the cherry on top….your correspondent, with a modicum of luck was in fact 100% successful in the dire prediction that Infinity, of Wanaka, are indeed the purchasers of the Noble Subdivision. Our friends at Delta have issued a breathless press release explaining they are or have received $0.9m – yes $0.9M, from their friends at Infinity. The sky is blue, houses will be built, Delta’s financial fruit will follow. Fancy that !! Let us allow reality to intrude : This is the first, and only guaranteed payment that Delta will receive for the outstanding $25M+ debt they have incurred there. That’s not low hanging fruit, it’s been trampled underfoot and is not even worth stewing (over). Trampled underfoot also is the small matter of the outstanding interest. Would it be churlish to remind readers that Delta, of course, has written off about $12M in interest because it wanted to protect certain reputations more than it wanted to protect ratepayers ? Would it spoil Delta’s collective fist pump to remind them that $0.9M is no more than (and likely less than) 4% of the outstanding debt ? Yes I thought so. Delta as debt collectors ? = EpicFail.
Missing in Delta’s gushing remarks from Grady Cameron was any mention of the Constructive Fraud action. It seems that the hapless Mr Smillie has taken Delta down a dark cul-de-sac yet again this week. Mr Smillie has opposed Delta being joined to the constructive fraud action, with a mistaken understanding of High Court rule 4.56. However, that rule is not relevant and it is trumped by High Court Rules 4.1 and 4.3 which allow parties to be joined. Basically, the rules allow that a plaintiff can joinder anyone at any time, and the plaintiff caveator in this action is 100% unlikely to allow the central party to the constructive fraud action (yes, that is you Grady as CEO of Delta) to smile bashfully and say “can I go now?” after having undermined the interests of the neighbours on occasions too numerous to count at this point. Oh well Mr Smillie, another unpaid legal bill….
This is an important point because our Delta friends seem oblivious to the impending legal actions they are facing. Delta think that because the caveats were lifted, all is well, but that is still subject to a court of appeal hearing, and the way is open now for Delta to have another action brought against them by the neighbours. Delta and the DCC’s pockets are deeper than Gold Band’s, and they can’t go broke, so from the neighbours’ view, what’s not to like ?
Delta’s utter stupidity is revealed when the press release acknowledges that they have allowed a bank lender to take the first mortgage over the property, and have put themselves, yet again in the same weak position. As noted in the Delta —EpicFraud #10 post, Dunedin City Council just needed to show a scrap of acumen and take control of the subdivision. Now their fortunes are tied to an even weaker developer than Noble (how is that possible ?), who has managed to lose, much, much more money than Noble (truth stranger than fiction), and to cap it off, are in the same second mortgage position. This is not logical. But it is a windfall – for Infinity. Could there be a quid pro quo somewhere ?
Turnips all round. Readers, consider when voting, that Cr Lee Vandervis is the only surviving councillor (there were only ever two, Hilary RIP from Council) who grasps this major issue and has fought for the ratepayers. Cr Vandervis has never been one to accept Mr Crombie’s vague platitudes and was always wary of Mr McKenzie. Vandervis for Mayor.
[ends]
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From: Gary Johnson [Gary.Johnson @thinkdelta.co.nz]
Sent: Fri, 26 Aug 2016 at 4:21 p.m.
Message: Please find media release attached regarding a breakthrough on recovery of outstanding debt owed to Delta in relation to the Yaldhurst Village subdivision.
█ 160826 Media Statement_Breakthrough on Yaldhurst subdivision debt recovery
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“With a new developer, new financing and removal of the caveats, the way is now clear for the Yaldhurst Village subdivision to restart….” Mr Grady (sic) said. –emphasis by whatifdunedin
### ODT Online Fri, 26 Aug 2016
Delta sells Christchurch subdivision
By Vaughan Elder
Delta has hailed the sale of a controversial Christchurch subdivision as a breakthrough in its efforts to recover $13.4 million in bad debt. The Dunedin City Council owned infrastructure company yesterday announced Wanaka-based developers Infinity Group purchased the Yaldhurst Village subdivision. […] The purchase means Delta has entered a new loan agreement with Infinity Yaldhurst Limited, to replace the existing $13.4 million debt owed to Delta by the original developer.
Read more [See tomorrow’s ODT]
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● INFINITY YALDHURST LIMITED (5886102)
Incorporation Date: 09 Feb 2016
Address for service:
Jackson Valentine Limited, Level 3, 258 Stuart Street, Dunedin 9016
http://www.companies.govt.nz/co/5886102Ultimate holding company :
● INFINITY INVESTMENT GROUP HOLDINGS LIMITED (1004601)
Incorporation Date: 06 Dec 1999
Address for service:
Jackson Valentine Limited, Level 3, 258 Stuart Street, Dunedin 9016
http://www.companies.govt.nz/co/1004601
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Related Posts and Comments:
8.8.16 Delta #EpicFail —Epic Fraud #11 : The Buyer
1.8.16 Delta #EpicFail —The End Game according to CD
31.7.16 Delta #EpicFail —Epic Fraud #10 : The Beginning of the End : Grady Cameron and his Steam Shovel
█ For more, enter the terms *delta*, *noble* or *epic fraud* in the search box at right.
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Posted by Elizabeth Kerr
Election Year. This post is offered in the public interest.
What if? Dunedin... 
Less than 1 million!
Has it been paid yet?
Who is backing Infinity?
Murray Frost
Mike Queenstown
Mayoral aspirant Jim
The mire just gets deeper.
My LGOIMA request for the audio file from the non-public section of the full council meeting on 1 August – where the infamous Delta decision was crassly unscrupulously made without due diligence on the part of all Councillors – has been met with notice of an extension. The transcriber (ho ho ho) apparently needs longer, says DCC, and for legal advice informing redaction.
The DCC under control of Mr Crombie is as bad as it gets. We’ve got it in spades. So much so that weak Mayor Cull and his hind leg Thomson sold you out, Ratepayers. Sold You Out – for tens of millions of dollars in the last two trimesters – pressed by Delta CEO Grady Cameron, the Delta Board of Directors including McLauchlan, and the bumph DCHL Directors. All keen to spend Rates funds to cover gross errors of business judgment involving the misdirection and loss of public funds.
All the while, in the context of the Yaldhurst subdivision, seriously harming a good number of Christchurch ratepayers, to boot. Some of whom (the neighbours) have the utter bravery to fight back, for what is rightfully theirs.
Confusing situation. Not everyone was good at decimals, at school.
That’s why tradesmen talk about metres and millimetres, it’s so you don’t get 90cm or 9.0 cm when you wanted 9.0metres.
$0.9 million is a lot like $90 Million if you’re very dim and too slack to pay attention.
And too arrogant to listen to Lee Vandervis, who understands decimals and fractions and can spot lies and rorts and inefficiencies – not that it has done much good.
“Sit down and shut up, Vandervis!”
In other words Cull liked a council all wearing matching blinkers. Everyone smile, don’t let bad news come out to bother us. So what if it costs ratepayers $millions?
“Vandervis, why do you refuse to put on your blinkers and ‘see no evil’? You’re answerable to ME. Forget about the public, they only matter once every 3 years!”
[Looks at calendar, quickly adjusts chain] “Vote for ME, your mate Dave who has looked after your city so incredibly well that Dunedin is almost on a par with Auckland! OK so we’re close to their debt per person, but look what I’ve given you. Sculptured teeth! Hargest Island made famous in Facebook, until it had to be demolished so emergency vehicles could get through. Cycle lanes as wide as vehicle lanes down by the hospital! A whole lot of vehicles we didn’t even miss were got rid of with so little fuss that almost nobody knew, except that frightful Vandervis who insisted on trying to warn people.
Yes, Vote for SuperDave, I promise to keep on ignoring facts and smiling!”
Dear Lord. Noooo, not Daaaave !!!
*scream
WAIT-A-MINUTE
Dave Cull, in obsequious comments about Council’s Delta decision (ODT 3.8.16), said the purchaser of the Noble subdision at Yaldhurst would pay $1 million to Delta immediately.
Grady Cameron now says $0.9 million – read $900,000.
Who is right?
Councillors weren’t able to ask Grady any questions before the deal was done – presumably, because Crombie had instructed a No-show by the Delta CEO at the Council meeting on 1 August.
Ratepayers need to ask Grady or Gary Johnson for immediate clarification.
Sat, 27 Aug 2016
ODT: Subdivision sale hailed by Delta
Delta has hailed the sale of a controversial Christchurch subdivision to a Wanaka-based developer [Infinity Group] as a breakthrough in its efforts to recover $13.4million in bad debt. […] The sale was yesterday slammed by the subdivision’s neighbour, Colin Stokes, who repeated the accusation the sale was part of an illegal plan to cheat him and fellow neighbours out of their interest, as caveators, in the land. Cont/
There’s something amiss with the mainstream media reporting.
Court records and Delta media releases reveal Delta’s debt is about $25m and that Delta owned 67.5% of the first mortgage and 100% controlled it.
Reporting should at the least then be that
– Delta is trying to recover $13.4 million of its “$25 million debt”, not it’s “$13.4 million debt”; and that when referring to the first mortgagee should at least read
– “32.5% owner of the first mortgage, Gold Band, ……”
To report the false charade that the joint venture Noble Investments, Gold Band and Delta want others to believe (that Gold Band was the 100% bonafide first mortgagee exercising first mortgagee powers to recover its first mortgage debt and nothing else) is to assist them to cover up this falsehood.
Of course there is something wrong with the MSM reporting. The whole point of media releases is to be part of the spin and obscuring of any facts. We have all seen how news or “issues” are handled and the first thing that happens is that a “communications” person – have you ever heard of a bigger oxymoron – composes a piece of flippery that mainly contains BS. By the way, any such piece containing the phrase “going forward” should be inserted forcibly into said communications person’s orifice designed to produce such material.
In this case, Delta are desperate to contain the news that despite all that has happened in the past and their woeful, but highly paid performance in running a business, they are still capable of getting chin-deep in practices that would not be out of place in the back streets of some Russian gulag and have managed to flush millions of ratepayers’ dollars straight down the toilet.
So what happens? Eager beaver down at the Oddity gets a press release hot off the wire and is able to lift chunks or paraphrase the lot to pretend that they have been doing a diligent job in ferreting out the facts. Reporters are, unfortunately, a vital part of the corporate “communications” industry. Where is the story about how this loss occurred and who was responsible? Where were the hard-hitting questions put to Cameron, Crombie, Cull and Thomson?
Rest easy Delta – give yourselves a big bonus for a job well done in applying a thick coat of BS.
Not as a dig, russandbev, email this to Vaughan Elder. He’ll be reading this anyway I’m guessing.
Delta chief executive Grady Cameron fronts up in the media as head chair leader for Delta, but strangely not available to councilors to explain how he got Delta into this mess in the first place.
https://www.odt.co.nz/news/dunedin/dcc/subdivision-sale-hailed-delta
Orchardists get the same thing in a bad season, it can knock their finances into a cocked hat.
It’s called hail damage and it’s a real bastard.
Wouldn’t wish it on a city!
On local government reforms:
Sat, 27 Aug 2016
Minister: criticism just electioneering
Southern mayors have been accused of electioneering after hitting out at National’s local government reforms. The criticism came from Local Government Minister Peseta Sam Lotu-Iiga, after mayors across the South criticised the Better Local Services reforms as an attack on local democracy.
[the HUGE farce considering DCC, Delta, Aurora and DCHL….]:
Given the first mortgage debt amount at the time of sale was about $8.4million and Delta had bought 67.5% of the first mortgage starting in 2013 (so value $5.7million at the time of the sale)… how come they didn’t get this $5.7million first mortgage sum from the first mortgage sale? Where is it?
Remember this purchase of 67.5% of the first mortgage off Gold Band had nothing to do with the infrastructure work and the reduction to $13.4 million for it. They’re completely separate. So whose pocket is the separate $5.7 million in?