Greater South Dunedin : Public Meeting, Monday 12 June 6.30pm

Public Meeting South Dunedin: It’s your future!
Monday 12 June 6.30pm Nations Church. Please come!

It’s almost two years since the devastating 2015 floods which hit the suburbs of Greater South Dunedin, affecting more than a thousand homes, businesses, community organisations and schools.

It is timely to hold another public meeting in order to give you a voice and to provide an opportunity for some information sharing and discussion about the priorities for our community.
We hope you will attend.

Ray Macleod, Chair
The Greater South Dunedin Action Group

Background Information:

There’s been a lot of talk about the future of Greater South Dunedin.

Some of that talk has been muddled by poor quality information collected and published around the extent and causes of the flooding on our community. Eventually the Dunedin City Council acknowledged that its lack of maintenance of the mud tanks and its lack of oversight of the performance of the Portobello Pumping Station contributed 200mm to the flooding that occurred.

Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment, Jan Wright, warned earlier in 2016 that South Dunedin presented the “most troubling example” of high groundwater in the country.

The DCC and the Otago Regional Council have produced reports on the flooding and the issues facing Greater South Dunedin due to rising groundwater and the impact of climate change. Their reports are largely based on predictions and modelling assumptions.

There have been reports by GNS Science and the University of Otago’s School of Surveying of potential subsidence in South Dunedin and other parts of the city. At the time, GNS cautioned against reading too much into the subsidence data, as more work was required.

The DCC has finally announced a temporary community hub will open at Cargill Enterprises on Hillside Road mid-year.
After much public outcry, the South Dunedin Work and Income and Police station re-opened their doors.

The DCC formed a stakeholder group of organisations and government agencies, some of whom have a presence in South Dunedin, which meets every month or so.

Heavy rainfall over Easter demonstrated that the City’s civil defence preparedness and response has improved, although local people are yet to be fully informed about how they can be better prepared and understand how a civil defence emergency may affect them.

The DCC’s Second Generation Plan has held hearings into the Hazard 3 (Coastal) Overlay which covers the area bounded by Forbury Rd to the west, Victoria Road to the south, the Caversham bypass motorway to the North and Portsmouth drive to the east. This includes a provision to require new residential dwellings to be “relocatable”.

The DCC also recently announced new “minimum floor” levels for new buildings in South Dunedin of 500 mm for those not affected by the 2015 floods and 400mm above the floodwaters for those affected by the 2015 floods. This will result in some new houses having to be a metre above ground level in order to get a building consent. GIVEN THE DCC CONTRIBUTED 200MM TO THE 2015 FLOOD LEVEL THIS RAISES A QUESTION REGARDING THE NEED FOR ANY MINIMUM FLOOR LEVEL REQUIREMENT OR A CASE BY CASE EVALUATION AS THE NEED ARISES.

If you live or work in the Greater South Dunedin area, all of these proposed changes and approaches affect you. Put together they provide a confusing picture of an important community which is receiving mixed messages about its future and doesn’t yet feel it has a strong voice and a plan.

In all of the discussions about the future of Greater South Dunedin, the people who call these suburbs (of South Dunedin, St Kilda, St Clair, Forbury, Caversham, Caledonian, Portsmouth Drive, parts of Musselburgh and Tainui) home or work are not yet part of the discussions.

You may have attended a public meeting after the floods which resulted in the formation of the Greater South Dunedin Action Group. We consider you to be an important part of this group as it aims to:

• Facilitating effective communication between the community and the city and regional councils
• Advocating, representing and promoting the present and future interests of the community
• Ensuring the area is well serviced by Council in terms of social and infrastructure services as a foundation for a vibrant community
• Exploring the opportunities for the area including inner city redevelopment, renewal, and support for new job opportunities & enterprise
• Developing a sustainable plan for the future of the Greater South Dunedin area and its community

[ends]

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Greater South Dunedin Action Group

Public Meeting
6:30pm Monday 12 June 2017
Nations Church
334 King Edward Street South Dunedin

Agenda
Meeting Chair: Hon Stan Rodger

1. Welcome: Hon Stan Rodger

2. Apologies

3. Dunedin City Council & Otago Regional Council on what has been achieved over the past two years. Response to questions submitted to DCC copies are which will be circulated to the meeting. (15 Minutes)

4. Dr Simon Cox: A geoscientist’s perspective on the problem at hand.
(15 minutes)

5. Mr Geoff Thomas: Property Council of NZ. Impact on property values.
(10 minutes)

6. Questions from the floor (if wishing to ask questions please try to write these down and direct them through the Hon Stan Rodger).

7. Proposed resolutions:
a) That the meeting provide a mandate to the Greater South Dunedin Action Group to act as an advocate for the community interests.
b) That the DCC are requested to provide an initial engineering plan and response by 1 December 2017 with the intention of providing protection and support to people, homes and businesses in the Greater South Dunedin area.
c) The DCC be requested to commence the establishment of a community board to represent the interests of the Greater South Dunedin Community.

8. Any other business.

9. A wrap up and thank you from the Chair of the Greater South Dunedin Action Group. (5 minutes)

10. Final words from the Hon Stan Rodger.

█ Download: SDAG Public Meeting Agenda (DOCX, 25 KB)

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Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

This post is offered in the public interest.

Profligate behaviour : MYTH paraded as fact…… just like Aurora Energy’s propaganda campaign

Council infrastructure and networks committee chairwoman Cr Kate Wilson said last night the project would go ahead “regardless”. There was funding for three years, she said, and the fourth year’s funding would be part of next year’s long-term plan, and the one after that. The project was needed for safety reasons to prevent vehicles driving into the harbour and climate change making the road undriveable. (ODT) *Emphasis by whatifdunedin

Yeah right.

### ODT Online Fri, 26 May 2017
Botched cycleway estimate short by $13m
By David Loughrey
A bungled Dunedin City Council cost estimate to complete safety improvements and a cycle/walkway on Otago Peninsula has left the project more than $13 million short. The council announced yesterday an estimate for the project on Portobello Rd and Harington Point Rd that includes a cycle/walkway from Taiaroa Head to the city had risen from $20 million to $49 million. The earlier estimate, drawn up  in 2011, did not include parts of the cycleway to be built, land that had to be bought and a contingency fund to cover unforeseen expenses. […] Despite the cost rise, the council will start construction this year, with a shared cycle/walkway design.
Read more

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Powerlines at sunset [garp.com]

Meanwhile WE will be paying for our Otago power network TWICE, at a crippling cost to business and residential power consumers well into the future —thanks to Dunedin City Council’s unsatisfactory governance of the companies Aurora Energy / Delta Utility Services and Dunedin City Holdings and, above all, the Council’s unfettered use of public funds to realise the dream of the Tartan Mafia and Professional Rugby to build the now frequently empty and under-utilised Forsyth Barr Stadium. (three concerts by Ed Sheeran in highly doubtful acoustic conditions inside ‘the roof’ does not a Christmas make).

All this because the Council conveniently fails to ensure it covers the infrastructural basics (in this instance: the safe, secure and continuous supply of electricity) – affordably – for the static if bearly stable City of Dunedin, and the sparcely populated Otago region in the mode of fast pumping growth. (There are simply too few permanent ratepayers to uphold ‘big bloated dreams’ and money siphoning on the rates take).

The Council did not ensure that Aurora Energy / Delta Utility Services were sufficiently well structured to Avoid profligate spending, making subvention payments to the stadium companies, or borrowing to pay dividends to the Council. (Probably the least of it).

There have been YEARS of dangerous neglect, embellishing the lack of repair and upgrade to the Community of Otago’s electricity network.

The Council is not well enough controlled (corporate and financial oversight) in order to Avoid its own profligate spending —so to protect, support and upgrade Otago’s power network as the solid basis for regional economic development and SAFE living —with CERTAINTY and SECURITY OF SUPPLY.

Instead, The People will now be plunged into further debt by the circus wheel of local body politicians and the morally thin and rather malevolent boards of directors (masters of spin) controlling the companies.

It’s time the People of Dunedin and Otago took control of their power infrastructure. Resolving, if they will, to adopt a different ownership and delivery model – one option is to form a democratically elected Community Power Trust to own and oversee the network; this is a sound regional model that is proven to work in other jurisdictions, with all due care.

WE have to Safeguard our future.
Not leave decision-making to unvetted members of the Tartan Mafia.
Especially not those in thrall to the likes of Gordon Stewart and his ilk (a vague reference to Delta’s speculative dealings at Yaldhurst, Christchurch – Delta is presently in a discovery process via an action brought to the Christchurch High Court by Caveators claiming Constructive Fraud).

DO NOT sell the ‘fragments remaining’ of the Otago Power Network (as bleated by some in power who can’t/won’t maintain a local body balance sheet – like you trust them, already?!) – to overseas corporates who will hike power prices disastrously to satisfy their shareholders.

Proceed carefully, OTAGO.

ASK QUESTIONS. RESEARCH. DO YOUR SUMS.
DON’T BE TOLD WHAT TO DO. ACT RESPONSIBLY FOR THE FUTURE PROSPERITY OF YOUR KITH AND KIN.
DO NOT PLACE FAITH IN OLD SPIN MAESTERS AND THEIR DEPUTIES.

We’ve seen them all before and have the new $1+ BILLION ‘invoice’ from Aurora Energy to prove it. Yes, we thought we had already paid over that amount in electricity and lines dues.

The suited ones bringing the clamour are looking after themselves – not US, not OUR COMMUNITY.

This is now a ransom.

The UGLY sister companies remain joined at the hip : Delta is Aurora Energy’s “preferred contractor”. And Steve is new, so don’t blame him! ….Really?

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[propaganda – Aurora Energy]

After facing unrelenting pressure to up its game, Aurora Energy says it has stepped up to the challenge.

Sat, 27 May 2017
Dawn of a new Aurora era
By Vaughan Elder
Aurora chairman Steve Thompson said it had been under the “spotlight and the heat lamp” since accusations broke last October that it was endangering the public and workers by leaving its network, and in particular power poles, to deteriorate. That pressure turned ugly at times and workers had been verbally abused, including while out doing their supermarket shopping. Mr Thompson blamed the abuse on what he described as unfair criticism and media coverage. But Mr Thompson said in the face of adversity, Aurora and its sister company Delta had achieved a “hell of a lot” in a short space of time. The two companies were well on their way to splitting up in a divorce which Mr Thompson said would cost money in the short-term but reap huge benefits in the long-term. Aurora was also mid-way through an ambitious accelerated pole replacement programme and this week announced a $720million plan to upgrade its ageing network.
….Mr Thompson said its actions should help renew the public’s faith in both companies, but emphasised he believed that faith had been unfairly shaken by what he described as over-the-top criticism in the past seven months. He said safety concerns about the 2910 red-tagged poles across Dunedin, Central Otago and Queenstown Lakes had been overblown. At the same time, Delta and Aurora’s efforts to confront the problem, both before and after the story broke in October, had been under-reported, he said.
….Despite his anger at the way Aurora had been treated by critics and in the Otago Daily Times, he was under no illusion the network was in top shape, saying it was the second oldest network in New Zealand and acknowledged major work was needed to improve it in the next 10 years. But he would not be drawn on whether the situation had come about as a result of decades of underinvestment, which has been one of the main criticisms levelled at Aurora since October. He said he was not in a position to comment given he only started midway through last year.
Read more

CRITICAL ABHORRENCE FOR TOP CHAPS IN THE AURORA / DELTA / DCHL ‘EXECUTIVE’ (PAST AND PRESENT) WILL CONTINUE UNABATED IN THE PUBLIC SPHERE UNTIL THEY AND THEIR FRIENDS ARE OUSTED AND MADE ANSWERABLE TO HIGHER AUTHORITIES.

Otago people must busy themselves.
Time for formal inquiries. Time to REMODEL.

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Related Post and Coments:
24.5.17 SCANDAL : Aurora Energy Ltd set to burden Otago ratepayers and residents with massive rates increases

█ For more, enter the terms *aurora*, delta*, *epic fraud*, *poles*, *healey* or *dchl* in the search box at right.

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Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

This post is offered in the public interest.

‘GNS study’ story lacks all credibility

### NZ Herald Sun, 21 May 2017 at 8:55 AM
Higher seas may force New Zealand towns to retreat inland: GNS Science study to investigate
By Jamie Morton
Researchers have begun investigating how some New Zealand communities could be pulled back from hazard zones in the face of flooding driven by climate change and sea level rise. A new study, to be led by GNS Science as part of a near million-dollar wider research programme, will look at ways authorities and communities can plan for homes to be moved to safer ground. It is estimated two thirds of Kiwis live in areas prone to flooding. At least 43,000 homes lie within 1.5 metres of the present average spring high tide, and nearly 9000 within 50cm. The most optimistic emissions scenario has global average sea levels likely to rise between 44cm and 55cm by 2100. One way to meet this threat is with what’s called “managed retreat” – shifting back houses and infrastructure and allowing the shoreline to move inland. “In New Zealand, there have always been communities in hazard areas, particularly on the coast, and this is something that’s always been an option,” said GNS researcher Emily Grace, who is leading the study. “But it’s definitely had more prominence in the last few years with people becoming more aware of sea level rise and the effects of global warming.” While there were measures within the Resource Management Act that authorities could use to help plan for shifting homes or roads, the issue was fraught with complexity. There were conflicts between what actions regional and district councils could take, and private property rights also posed barriers for planners, Ms Grace said. “It’s the kind of thing that goes in the too-hard basket, really – and part of the point of the research is to find out why it has not been carried out by councils in New Zealand and what could help change that.” With the exception of Christchurch’s post-quake red zone, she could cite just a few examples of such moves being taken. NZME.
Read more

[The propaganda]
NZ and climate change (via NZ Herald)
• Under present projections, the sea level around New Zealand is expected to rise between 50cm and 100cm this century, while temperatures could also increase by several degrees by 2100.
• Climate change would bring more floods (about two-thirds of Kiwis live in areas prone to flooding); make our freshwater problems worse and put more pressure on rivers and lakes; acidify our oceans; put even more species at risk and bring problems from the rest of the world.
• Climate change is also expected to result in more large storms, compounding the effects of sea level rise.
• New Zealand, which reported a 23% increase in greenhouse gas emissions between 1990 and 2014, has pledged to slash its greenhouse gas emissions by 30% from 2005 levels and 11% from 1990 levels by 2030.

12.5.17 ODT: Higher floor levels for some houses
From today, floors in houses to be built in low-lying areas of Dunedin could be up to 1m off the ground following the introduction of new “interim” minimum floor levels.

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Interesting opinion piece in the ODT today: ‘Left showed the Right the way’ by Andrew Waterworth. He says:

Postmodernism’s critique of science has paved the way for a broader questioning of whether empirical truths established through scientific method can be trusted. This has created fertile ground for the far Right to assert that science is a matter of opinion, to challenge scientific evidence for climate change, for example and to propose “alternative facts”. (ODT 22.5.17)

Instead, I would have said ‘this has created fertile ground for right thinking people to assert that computer-modelled science on climate change is just a box of fluffy ducks’. Because the ‘righters’ been stung by the evil tentacles, oh so many tentacles.

Obviously, the whole point is that the climate changers, vast numbers of them, ie millions of lemmings, have been riding high on false data for too long; false data initiated and supported by global corporates hand in hand with scrumpy academics, who both create and clip the tickets to gobble up Your Money and Assets. See too, what numbing expectations Central Government and the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment are placing on local authorities across New Zealand – and how those ‘with power’ around us are swallowing the cc distortions whole, applying mandates with fuzzy zeal in the complete absence of scientifically factual critical contest.

I think Mr Waterworth reads Dellers at Breitbart.

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Donald Trump | Pope Francis [salon.com]

### breitbart.com 18 May 2017
Delingpole: Pope Will Convert Trump on Climate Change, Claims Bishop
By James Delingpole
When President Trump visits the Vatican next week, he will be transformed by the radiant wisdom of His Holiness, the Pope, into a fully fledged climate change believer. Or so – somewhat optimistically – the bishop in charge of the Vatican’s Pontifical Academies of Science and Social Sciences has claimed. Bishop Marcelo Sánchez Sorondo, the Academies’ chancellor, said in an interview:

They will come to an agreement, since the president claims to be a Christian, and so he [Trump] will listen to him [the Pope].

Actually, you can bet your bottom dollar that this won’t happen, not least because the Pope’s views on climate change are in many ways profoundly unChristian. This was why the Pope’s 2015 encyclical on environmental issues Laudato Si was so controversial. It bought into the extreme environmentalist view which sees mankind as a blight on the planet rather than a blessing, and sees the industrial progress which brings jobs and prosperity as a curse.
Here is a sample of the encyclical.

But a sober look at our world shows that the degree of human intervention, often in the service of business interests and consumerism, is actually making our earth less rich and beautiful, ever more limited and grey, even as technological advances and consumer goods continue to abound limitlessly. We seem to think that we can substitute an irreplaceable and irretrievable beauty with something which we have created ourselves.

It also took at face value all the climate scaremongering which alarmists have been dishonestly propagating these last few decades, against all scientific evidence.

The melting in the polar ice caps and in high altitude plains can lead to the dangerous release of methane gas, while the decomposition of frozen organic material can further increase the emission of carbon dioxide.

Carbon dioxide pollution increases the acidification of the oceans and compromises the marine food chain.

One U.S. Congressman – Rep Paul Gozar – complained it made the Pope sound like a “leftist politician”.
Read more

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elevating climate change [freakingnews.com via pinterest]

### breitbart.com 20 May 2017
Delingpole: ‘Penises Cause Climate Change’; Progressives Fooled by Peer-Reviewed Hoax Study
By James Delingpole
Gender studies is a fake academic industry populated by charlatans, deranged activists and gullible idiots. Now, a pair of enterprising hoaxers has proved it scientifically by persuading an academic journal to peer-review and publish their paper claiming that the penis is not really a male genital organ but a social construct. The paper, published by Cogent Social Sciences – “a multidisciplinary open access journal offering high quality peer review across the social sciences” – also claims that penises are responsible for causing climate change.
The two hoaxers are Peter Boghossian, a full-time faculty member in the Philosophy department at Portland State University, and James Lindsay, who has a doctorate in math and a background in physics.
They were hoping to emulate probably the most famous academic hoax in recent years: the Sokal Hoax – named after NYU and UCL physics professor Alan Sokal – who in 1996 persuaded an academic journal called Social Text to accept a paper titled “Transgressing the Boundaries: Towards a Transformative Hermeneutics of Quantum Gravity”.
Sokal’s paper – comprising pages of impressive-sounding but meaningless pseudo-academic jargon – was written in part to demonstrate that humanities journals will publish pretty much anything so long as it sounds like “proper leftist thought;” and partly in order to send up the absurdity of so much post-modernist social science. So, for this new spoof, Boghossian and Lindsay were careful to throw in lots of signifier phrases to indicate fashionable anti-male bias:

We intended to test the hypothesis that flattery of the academic Left’s moral architecture in general, and of the moral orthodoxy in gender studies in particular, is the overwhelming determiner of publication in an academic journal in the field. That is, we sought to demonstrate that a desire for a certain moral view of the world to be validated could overcome the critical assessment required for legitimate scholarship. Particularly, we suspected that gender studies is crippled academically by an overriding almost-religious belief that maleness is the root of all evil. On the evidence, our suspicion was justified.

They also took care to make it completely incomprehensible.

We didn’t try to make the paper coherent; instead, we stuffed it full of jargon (like “discursive” and “isomorphism”), nonsense (like arguing that hypermasculine men are both inside and outside of certain discourses at the same time), red-flag phrases (like “pre-post-patriarchal society”), lewd references to slang terms for the penis, insulting phrasing regarding men (including referring to some men who choose not to have children as being “unable to coerce a mate”), and allusions to rape (we stated that “manspreading,” a complaint levied against men for sitting with their legs spread wide, is “akin to raping the empty space around him”). After completing the paper, we read it carefully to ensure it didn’t say anything meaningful, and as neither one of us could determine what it is actually about, we deemed it a success.

Some of it was written with the help of the Postmodern Generator – “a website coded in the 1990s by Andrew Bulhak featuring an algorithm, based on NYU physicist Alan Sokal’s method of hoaxing a cultural studies journal called Social Text, that returns a different fake postmodern ‘paper’ every time the page is reloaded.” […] None of it should have survived more than a moment’s scrutiny by serious academics. But it was peer-reviewed by two experts in the field who, after suggesting only a few changes, passed it for publication.
Read more

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Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

This post is offered in the public interest.

TOMMYROT from ‘academic’ local authorities…. #SouthDunedin it’s PUNCH BACK TIME

At Facebook:

More in tomorrow’s newspaper.

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Chairman of the Otago chapter of the Property Council New Zealand Geoff Thomas says policymakers need to be careful not to damage property development opportunities in South Dunedin.

### ODT Online Wed, 10 May 2017
Policy could hold back South Dunedin
By Margot Taylor
Residential property development in South Dunedin could be “squashed” by the Dunedin City Council’s overly cautious natural hazards policies, the Otago branch president of the Property Council New Zealand warns.
Geoff Thomas said a proposal under the proposed second generation Dunedin city district plan (2GP), to require all residential properties in the area to be movable, could stymie the replacement of housing stock. The proposed policy ignored costs associated with residential development, including land, compliance costs and construction materials. “Making residential housing relocatable doesn’t make sense. I, personally, have sold a 1980s house with aluminium joinery for $1 to be moved.” If approved, the proposal would result in either more substandard houses, or houses that would be “very expensive” to build, he said. The natural hazards policies did not adequately consider current and potential technologies to manage sea-level rise and floods. “I think South Dunedin is full of opportunity. A lot of the housing stock is from a day gone by. It is an opportunity to do something with the area and our concern is we don’t want to end up with a caravan park out there.” Water drainage was a clear issue. A more reasonable approach to protect the economic viability of the area could be taken to address it.
Read more

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Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

This post is offered in the public interest.

JimmyJones deflates *mad utterings* of Prof Emer Jim Flynn

Received from JimmyJones
2017/03/17 at 7:43 pm

Prof Flynn, Emeritus Professor in Politics, deserves much criticism for his use of fake facts to support his presentation to the DCC councillors on Monday. He is said to have a good understanding of scientific methodology and so he should have known better than to use spindoctored, hyper-exaggerated data. Perhaps it was deliberate. Remember that he is a red-to-the-core Lefty, having been an initiating member of the New Labour Party and the Alliance Party. He was an Alliance electoral candidate for a few elections and was #4 on the Alliance list near the end. Here is what he got wrong:

● the sea level at Dunedin isn’t the ludicrous 10mm/year, it’s not the fake 3.5mm/yr, it’s only 1.3mm/yr (source- Statistics NZ). That means that 25cm of sea level rise will take 192 years not the 17 years that the panicky professor said.

● the 25cm danger level seems to be his own creation – the ORC LIDAR data shows that South Dunedin is mostly over 1.0 metre above sea level and only a handful of properties are below 500mm. Probably there are no houses within 25cm of sea level; he says there are 1932. For the sea level to increase by 1.0 metre will take 769 years. Put it on your calendar.

● fear-monger Flynn tells us about the “huge erosion of polar ice” that started in 2014 – unfortunately he didn’t check the sea-level data which shows us that nothing unusual has happened to the sea level since 2014.

● Prof Flynn tried to scare us by saying that insurance companies are unlikely to cover sea-level rise in their policies in future (ODT- Flynn’s sea level figures disputed), but it turns out that even now, none of us are insured for sea-level rise. There has never been cover for gradual damage. He’s talking crap.

● The Otago Regional Council has had groundwater sensors at South Dunedin for several years and they tell us that there is no detectable increase in groundwater level (no increasing trend).
In fact, there is no reason for a rising sea to cause rising groundwater. There is no connection, except for some places which are close to the shoreline. Also, the South Dunedin groundwater level is about 600mm above sea level and so it is mostly not affected by the sea, since water doesn’t flow uphill. Have a look for yourself: the ORC has recently given us (almost) live groundwater sensor graphs for South Dunedin and other places – thanks ORC. There are four South Dunedin groundwater sites:

█ http://water.orc.govt.nz/WaterInfo/Catchment.aspx?r=Dunedin

Of the four groundwater sensors only the one closest to the shoreline shows a tidal influence. Other places similarly close to the sea are likely to have some tidal influence on their groundwater level. Further inland there is no effect.

[ends]

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At Facebook:

whatifdunedin says: Here is DCC and ORC’s outlandish and mythical project, designed to put Ratepayer Funds into the hands of private sector consultants for no good reason, and on it goes. Your elected representatives agreed to this rort:

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Related Post and Comments:
14.3.17 Brightness panicked [#effect]

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Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

This post is offered in the public interest.

Brightness panicked [#effect]

What we like to see is President Donald J. Trump and his colleagues having a good go to crash the academic anaerobic anthropogenic climate change creepsters. The “effect” lands at Dunedin suddenly, with ODT supporting a septic tank on its front page. Dear old Lacksense Fudgebrain.

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At Facebook:

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Received from Douglas Field
Tue, 14 Mar 2017 7:42 a.m.

Subject: Jim Flynn’s rant in ODT
Message: God – those headlines in today’s paper are incredible. This guy is nothing more than a political activist – scientist he is not. Cull even giving space and having this clown attempt to convince the people of Sth Dunedin and St Kilda are doomed is nothing short of alarmist criminality given the economic condition of those people at present.
Sheesh.

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Later this morning . . .

“I’m sorry but I had to draw something on this bloody awful crap.”

“Well – intelligence does not necessarily equate with sense – Flynn seems to be proof of that. Reading the Wiki article he doesn’t seem to have had much of the latter – all over the place politically. But why on earth did Cull give this guy any oxygen. Yep I know!”

“….Richard S. Lindzen, Prof Emeritus of Atmospheric Sciences
The following was sent by Lindzen to Trump. As you know, Lindzen is a pretty well versed physicist dealing with earth sciences but in this letter he sets out succinctly all that is wrong with Flynn’s arguments in that presentation written up in the ODT.”

“It is ‘hotting up’ in the US now that Scott Pruitt is in charge of the EPA.
There is a heap of screaming going on – mainly from Democrat senators and congressmen – but also from the tenured folk who will loose funding.
The ‘swamp is being drained’.”

“Ha ha”

“It will have a ‘flow on effect’ here and I think you can already see evidence of that – for example, Flynn’s outburst – but there are others – wouldn’t be surprised if Alan Mark doesn’t add his tuppence worth soon.”

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[screenshot]

█ https://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2017/03/lindzen-personal-paoc-explanation-final.pdf

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Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

This post is offered in the public interest.

No Integrity | Cull’s FULL INSULT to Ratepayers and Residents

The Star cites the Mayor-terrible:
“Creating the Vision. 2017: Positive, confident, outward-looking Dunedin”

█ Go to http://www.thestar.co.nz/news/creating-the-vision/

Opinion. The Mayor is a disgrace.

Starter for 10:
1. Responsible for DCC flooding South Dunedin in 2015
2. Responsible for Council’s lack of infrastructure spending and monitoring
3. Responsible for wasting +$20million pa of Ratepayer funds to prop up the loss-making Stadium
4. Responsible for Council not investigating the misuse of public funds by Carisbrook Stadium Charitable Trust
5. Responsible for wasting millions of Ratepayer dollars on unworkable cycleways
6. Responsible for overseeing lack of prosecutions for Jacks Point and Luggate
7. Responsible for Council ignoring constructive fraud and money write-offs at Noble Yaldhurst
8. Responsible for lack of prosecutions for Citifleet (+152 cars sold on, 2003-2013)
9. Responsible for lack of progress with council debt reduction
10. Responsible for criminal neglect of Otago’s power network via Aurora/Delta/DCHL boards and management

So yeah. Has kept Dunedin’s economy at a standstill since being elected to office.

Not a smart learner.
Deals in OBFUSCATION, hides behind deadbeat mouthpieces while practising a pronounced lack of fiducial responsibility to Ratepayers and Residents.
Ending in chaos and disaster for those set to inherit ‘Dunedin’.

Re lack of vision…
Responsible for the lack of Health & Safety leading to an appalling eye injury at the DCC-managed New Year 2017 event held in the Octagon.

Your main job, Mr Mayor, is to get the Otago power network and Dunedin’s water infrastructure, roads, reserves and community owned assets into first class working order.

But actually, just f*** off altogether.

Wanted: New leader with a cool business head, capable of rigour and empathy.

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Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

This post is offered in the public interest.

Michael Lewis : The Undoing Project —Interview with Kathryn Ryan #RNZ

Link received 27/12/2016 at 3:21 p.m.
Message: A lesson for some Dunedin ‘luminaries’ perchance?

It’s amazing how resistant, particularly powerful men, are to people coming from outside and giving them advice on how to make decisions.
—Michael Lewis

RNZ National
Trust your gut? Think again
From Nine To Noon with Kathryn Ryan, 10:09 am on 21 December 2016

[Abridged.] Michael Lewis is one of the most famous non-fiction writers in America. He has written 14 books, edited one and is a regular contributor to Vanity Fair. His books include the global best-selling Flash Boys – an expose of high speed scamming in the stock market; The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine – an account of shady financial transactions and accounting that led to the 2008 global financial meltdown and on which the film The Big Short was based and Moneyball, the story of a maverick outsider who beat the system.

Lewis’s new book is called The Undoing Project in which he profiles the professional and personal relationship between the behavioural psychologists Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky. Kahneman and Tversky’s work shed new light on how humans make decisions when faced with risk and uncertainty. They established that we generally trust our gut instinct, over the evidence, to guide our decision-making.

[simonandschuster.com]

Lewis says he came across Kahneman and Tversky after writing Moneyball. He says the two were very different personalities and that made for the perfect team.

“They sensed in the other something they wished they had. Kahneman is an unbelievable creative mind he really has a mind more like a poet or a novelist filled with these flashing insights about human nature. Tversky wanted to be a poet but he has a scientific, logical mind. He’s a brilliant logician.”

The two decide to come together and study how the human mind works. That work became an examination of human fallibility – the weakness of the human mind. They designed experiments to show how our mind plays tricks on us.

One they stumbled on was a phenomenon they called anchoring that skews human decisions. They also established that we are terrible at assessing risk – we rate risk based on what’s most memorable which tends to be what happened most recently.

[marketwatch.com]

“People long for the world to be a far more certain place than it is, instead of dealing with uncertainties they tell stories that make it seem much more certain and respond to stories that make it seem much more certain than it is. A politician speaking in certain terms as if he’s infallible has weirdly an advantage – even though we shouldn’t believe him. We’re very vulnerable to people who simulate certainty.”

Lewis is unsure whether this inbuilt fallibility can be fixed.

“I hate to sound fatalistic but one of the big takeaways from [Kahneman and Tversky’s] work is just how hard it is to correct for human fallibility – they equate cognitive illusion with optical illusion.”
Read more

█ Audio | Download: Ogg MP3 (26′07″)

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Michael Monroe Lewis (born Oct 15, 1960) was born in New Orleans to corporate lawyer J. Thomas Lewis and community activist Diana Monroe Lewis. He attended the college preparatory Isidore Newman School in New Orleans. He then attended Princeton University where he received a BA degree (cum laude) in Art History in 1982 and was a member of the Ivy Club. He went on to work with New York art dealer Daniel Wildenstein. He enrolled in the London School of Economics, and received his MA degree in Economics in 1985. Lewis was hired by Salomon Brothers and moved to New York for their training program. He worked at its London office as a bond salesman. He resigned to write Liar’s Poker and become a financial journalist. A contributing editor to Vanity Fair since 2009. More at Wikipedia.

Vanity Fair – Hive: Politics
█ Donald Trump and the Rules of the New American Board Game
By Michael Lewis Dec 18, 2016 7:00 pm
While volunteering at his daughter’s new high school, Michael Lewis watched kids of all races and backgrounds react to Trump’s election with a peaceful demonstration of their grief and fear. It inspired a game he’s devised for thinking about the future. Link

Vanity Fair – Hive: Politics
█ Obama’s Way
By Michael Lewis Sep 11, 2012 6:12 pm
To understand how air-force navigator Tyler Stark ended up in a thornbush in the Libyan desert in March 2011, one must understand what it’s like to be president of the United States—and this president in particular. Hanging around Barack Obama for six months, in the White House, aboard Air Force One, and on the basketball court, Michael Lewis learns the reality of the Nobel Peace Prize winner who sent Stark into combat. Link

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Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

This post is offered in the public interest.

*Image: Michael Lewis by Tabitha Soren / W.W. Norton Company
blackwhite by whatifdunedin

Baron de Gurgelaars on “Poles”

Delta needs more

—

Received.
Tue, 22 Nov 2016 at 7:56 p.m.

Winston said it best, without the poles we could not have won World War One.

He was right of course.

Poles allowed the allies to have rallying points around which the Anzacs could rally before running at the German machine guns with impunity.

Poles were helpful during World War II when they proffered their land to soak up the blitzkrieg, thus saving Russia and England who were then stuffed up by lend-lease so that all of their assets were owned by good old USA.

Poles have been helpful in Dunners as they kept the sand on the beach at St Clair until the DCC came up with an alternative to get Rid of the beach. After all, why should St Clair residents enjoy themselves at the beach whilst we are working diligently on Trade Me, stealing cars, conversion, contract fraud and obfuscation?

Our Poles are a critical element in our ambition to increase wages by 10%, increase staff numbers at the DCC by 10% and increase rates by over 10%. I mean you have all voted at the website supporting our plans to stuff Dunedin, you have all voted in the absolutely useless six existing councillors. And me! You’re going to get it-

More shops empty except in buildings owned by us.
No extra Hotel rooms unless they are based on less carparks for Dunedin ratepayers.
We will support Compass- After all how can we differentiate Compass Hospital food for the needy from perks for councillors?

Look we are here to help you.

To Help you to contribute more to rates, parking fees, and any other robbing scheme to boost our personal and collective DCC incomes at your (The ratepayers) expense.

The Baron de Gurgelaars

[ends]

—

Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

This post is offered in the public interest.

[you think this is a spoof ?]

*Image: newyorker.com – (civil) forfeiture

Baron de Gurgelaars on “Accountability” @ #DUD #Delta

Received.
Tue, 22 Nov 2016 at 7:34 p.m.

The Pimp from hell is back.

Le Baron de Gurgelaars on de French political system.

Le Interviewer: a qvestion

Le Cull de Mare- Cur, can you pls advise your council’s response to the suggestion that Delta is not involved in electricity generation.

Le Cull de Mare- Ve vill not find any vone guilty.

Le Interviewer- During 2016 your council has stuffed up on flooding, mud tank cleaning, paying Delta for a truck that did not exist in Dunedin, reducing the value of all houses in South Dunedin and not charging for water takeoff on the peninsula. What do you have to say about diese errors of judgement.

Le Cull de Mare- Ve vill not find any person guilty, particularly me.

During 2016, You personally blamed the flooding of South Dunedin on climate change. Do you believe that heavy rain did not fall on Dunedin prior to man’s intervention?

Le Cull de Mare- naturlich- Dunedin was a Desert.

During 2016- Fulton Hogan was exposed for not having any vehicle capable of cleaning the mud tanks and thus completing their mud tank contract. Did you consider a drawback of over $200,000 on their unperformed contract?

Le Cull de Mare- Nein, how can DCC staff get their Christmas bonuses without recourse to increase in rates unless they are allowed contractual licence (see poetic licence)

Le Interviewer- Today Cull de Mare, some properties in South Dunedin particularly Victoria street had reduced QV values. Whilst that will reduce their rates by 1%, their valuations can cause mortgagee sales by banks, increased weekly payments apart from divorces and suicides.

Le Cull de Mare- vot are you saying, you blame me for naming climate change for causing these personal catastrophes, you tink I am ze cause, vot u think I vant diese resulten?

Do u think I am Adolf Hitler?

De Interviewer-

Not Yet.

But power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

—

Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

This post is offered in the public interest.

*Image: cartoonswallpapers.net – Futurama Bender the Pimp

Good news for Cerebos Greggs and business development in Central Otago …….DCC stands divorced

Channel 39 Published on Nov 16, 2016
$20 million upgrade for historic Dunedin coffee factory
An historic Dunedin based coffee producer has received a multimillion-dollar overhaul. The Gregg’s coffee roasting facility has redeveloped its production line to meet growing demand for the caffeinated drink.

[screenshot ODTV]

### ODT Online Thu, 17 Nov 2016
Gregg’s spends $20m on Dunedin plant
By David Loughrey
Cerebos Gregg’s yesterday celebrated the completion of a $20 million investment in its Dunedin plant in Forth St. The investment over the past two and a-half years has paid for manufacturing upgrades including new production lines, a warehouse extension, improvements to environmental compliance, a new staff car park, staff facilities and an open plan main office. Australian-based chief executive Terry Svenson said the investment in the plant that supplied coffee throughout New Zealand meant production would continue on the site where coffee had been made since 1869. The factory produces coffee for brands including Gregg’s, Robert Harris, Orb, Civo and Bruno Rossi.
Read more

****

### ODT Online Wed, 16 Nov 2016
$14.7m for space centre
By Jono Edwards
An Alexandra satellite research centre could be operational by the middle of next year. There was elation in Central Otago yesterday as Minister for Science and Innovation Steven Joyce announced a grant of up to $14.7million over four years for the Centre for Space Science Technology (CSST). Central Otago Mayor Tim Cadogan called the announcement a “game-changer” for Alexandra and Central Otago, and said the centre, which would boost Alexandra’s economy by an estimated $2.8million to $3.6million a year in its first three years, was “up next to the gold rush”.
Read more

### ODT Online Thu, 17 Nov 2016
Innovation hub in Alex possible
By Jono Edwards
An Alexandra “innovation hub” hosting science entrepreneurs could be one of the spinoffs of a space-based research centre in the town. This week, Minister for Science and Innovation Steven Joyce announced a grant of up to $14.7million over four years for the Centre for Space Science Technology. Central Otago District Council economic development manager Warwick Hawker said that from the early days of the project, there had been discussions about creating an “innovation hub” in the town as an offshoot.
Read more

****

The ODT editorial congratulates “Alexandra and its commitment to secure a scientific future for Central Otago”. —And YAY(!), it swats Dunedin City Council as it should be SLAMMED.

In turn then, praise to ODT – for speaking out against DCC’s pig ignorant lack of support for local and regional business development, thanks to Mayor Cull and his greenie Councillors.

### ODT Online Thu, 17 Nov 2016
Editorial: Contrasting councils
OPINION A significant amount of government money is being invested in creating the Centre for Space Science Technology which will be based in Alexandra. In total, the Government is spending up to $14.7 million over four years for the new institution with additional funding from industry. It will operate as a private, independently governed organisation. Science and Innovation Minister Steven Joyce says the centre will undertake research to explore the use of space-based measurements and satellite imagery unique to New Zealand to meet the specific needs of regional industries. Mr Joyce says a standout aspect of the proposal was the centre also having research hubs in Dunedin, Canterbury and Taranaki, further encouraging research and development and innovation in regional New Zealand. […] Contrast the attitude of the nine members of the Dunedin City Council who quickly showed their so-called green credentials on the same day of the Alexandra announcement. Those nine councillors voted to call on the Government to place a moratorium on deep-sea oil and gas exploration and extraction. Only four members of the council understood the implications of the vote. The council is again proving itself to be not business friendly. Sadly, those 11 members do not understand the landscape on exploration has changed.
Read more

****

BS / Lunacy extraordinaire or, “You backed Cull, Julian” :

### ODT Online Wed, 16 Nov 2016
Council green as grass on oil exploration issue
By David Loughrey
The latest version of the Dunedin City Council has been quick to show its green credentials. A majority of nine “yes” votes overwhelmed four “no” votes and an abstention when the council voted to call on the Government to place a moratorium on deep-sea oil and gas exploration and extraction. The vote was, in a way, an early test of the collective thinking of the new council after last month’s elections, in which there were allegations of a green “bloc” that voted together at meetings.
Read more

Douglas Field Published on Nov 16, 2016
Green as grass
Dunedin City Council (again) voted to call on the government to place a moratorium on deep sea oil and gas exploration. “Green as Grass” the ODT says. Cabbage heads led by a ‘man o’ straw’ is what I say.

—

Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

This post is offered in the public interest.

COMPLETE Dis-satisfaction with DCC, DCHL, DVML, DVL, Delta….

Fake it til you make it, and hey, don’t lift the marigolds.

Sorry Daaave, looks like a D for your council’s governance. —Actually, for the avoidance of euphemism, make that D- and lower for DIRE Performance, accompanying Drivel, and Diabolical treatment of Residents and Ratepayers in the aftermath of emergency situations.

Listening to Yes People and your dwindling voter base isn’t your best hope to resolve ongoing multimillion-dollar losses being sustained by a couple of the council-owned companies, to the point where the holding company led by chairman Crombie, fronts with a “qualified audit” only on presentation of its annual report(?) to Council.

[In July 2015 Graham Crombie was appointed to the Commerce Commission as an Associate Commissioner for a five year term.]

Damages to employment, liveability and opportunity in a No-growth city keep stacking.

—

“It is also yet another example of good public service jobs being lost from our smaller towns and cities.” –PSA spokeswoman

### ODT Online Thu, 13 Oct 2016
ACC jobs to go in Dunedin
By Vaughan Elder
After consulting with staff since June, the decision had been made to relocate all the roles over the next 12 to 18 months to the larger Christchurch office and have “one centre for consistent customer and rehabilitation services across the Southern region”.
Read more

****

Asked about people who continued to be negative about the city, he said: “Negativity is an attitude, it’s not a fact.”

### ODT Online Thu, 13 Oct 2016
Survey ‘shows Dunedin on right track’
By Vaughan Elder
A survey showing Dunedin residents feel increasingly positive about their city shows the city is on the “right track”, Mayor Dave Cull says. […] the annual survey was not all good news. Last year’s June flood was picked as a reason for increasing dissatisfaction with the city’s stormwater system [down 13 points to 43%]. Satisfaction rates also fell when it came to public toilets, the suitability of the city’s roads for cycling and the availability of parks in the central city.
Read more

[Chief executive Sue Bidrose] said some of the areas where there had been negative results this year and in past surveys correlated to negative media coverage in the Otago Daily Times.

*1577 survey responses from 5400 residents randomly selected from the electoral roll,

The Talking Head (without helmet, unprepared)

█ Dunedin City Council (media release)
Residents’ Opinion Survey released 12 Oct 2016. Link

—

Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

*Image: cdn.guardian.ng – marigold, tweaked by whatifdunedin

Cracking the truth : June 2015 South Dunedin flood

OPINION received from Neil Johnstone
Sat, 10 Sep 2016 at 12:42 a.m.

Richard Stedman produces (below) a succinct review of the causes of, and failures after, the South Dunedin flood of June 2015. His frustrations appear to match those of Hilary Calvert that were published a few hours earlier. My reviews previously published on What if? Dunedin commencing back around February give more detail.

For your readers’ further consideration, Richard has highlighted the ‘200mm increase’ in flood level as a result of Portobello Road pumping station failures. The figure was derived by me, and appears in my review of the first DCC flood report. To my knowledge the only clear comparable DCC concessions have come from chief executive Sue Bidrose who admitted the figure publicly at the 20 June 2016 (yes, 2016) South Dunedin Action Group-organised public meeting, and subsequently.

The first DCC flood report (30 Nov 2015) is adamant that high groundwater was the cause of the flooding, and enough Councillors bought right into that excuse at the following Infrastructure Services Committee meeting. Just go back and view the video, if you’ve forgotten.

Dunedin City Council Published on Dec 7, 2015
Dunedin City Council – Council Meeting – November 30 2015
Discussion of the report starts at 1:09:52

The second (mudtank) DCC report of 26 April this year states: “Although Portobello Road’s performance did explain some of the length of time flooding was evident, much of the flooded area was below road level…” (para 31). No mention of increased depth of flooding there either, you will note.
[View report at Infrastructure Services Committee: Agenda & Reports 26 April (Part A, Item 5) pp 6-27.]

Neither DCC report mentions the additional depth of flooding caused by inaction at the Musselburgh pumping station.

History and ongoing design may rely on written commentaries. For the wellbeing of South Dunedin people, we must therefore continue to counter the misinformation contained in DCC reports, and in the more recent ORC (DCC-backed) South Dunedin “hazards” report. Even if ODT has switched off.

—

Related Posts at What if? Dunedin
8.3.16 [Review 1] Johnstone independent review of DCC report
19.5.16 [Review 2] Johnstone review of 2nd DCC report

Correspondence supplied
7.3.16 Letter, Chief Executive Sue Bidrose to Neil Johnstone
10.3.16 Response from Neil Johnstone to CE Bidrose

Sue Bidrose at ORC/DCC hazards presentation [radionz.co.nz]

****

OPINION received from Richard Stedman
Fri, 9 Sept 2016 at 8:24 p.m.

The ODT editorial department is peopled by closed minds, a number of whom subscribe to the climate change/rising sea level mantra and therefore manipulate their content to support their distorted view of the world. Mr Morris is captured by the former/present regime at city hall, a fate which befalls every reporter assigned to that round once they get their feet under the table.

Two weeks ago I prepared an opinion piece re the election and South Dunedin, outlining some of the issues as I see them in the hope that it might be published. I thought it was honestly held opinion, but it was rejected because it added “nothing new” to the debate, yet they run to Cull at every turn and run column after column of repetitive nonsense.

The following is my submission submitted on 24/8 and rejected the same day in this message: “Thanks for this submission, but we have had a “deluge” of flood letters and op eds from all sides so I don’t feel the need to highlight the issue again at the moment – certainly if there’s not anything new in it, as such”.

I have seen little evidence of the cited “deluge”.

The South Dunedin flood of June 2015 may be a tipping point during next month’s local body election. Many voters will look at the burgeoning candidates list for the Dunedin City Council and ask “who will provide the cornerstone elements of responsibility, accountability and integrity?”

Residents and business owners in South Dunedin have been sorely tested in recent times through the failure of the DCC to maintain its infrastructure. Among those adversely affected were elderly residents at Radius Fulton Home, including a number of dementia patients, the most vulnerable in our community, who were subjected to floodwaters containing sewage and transferred from the safety of their home in a crisis beyond acceptance. Some were accommodated as far away as Balclutha and Oamaru and three months passed before the facility was re-opened.

Following the flood, obfuscation clouded the failures that led to the inundation of homes and businesses and the investigation and report into the affair was 12 months in gestation. Officials and councillors, captured by the twin mantras of climate change and rising sea level, avoided any suggestion of culpability to limit the likelihood of litigation, and offered no solace that might have been construed as admission of liability.

The mayor and others were quick to blame rising sea level causing increased groundwater, combined with an “extreme weather event”, the result of climate change, and went so far as suggesting that a planned retreat from South Dunedin may be necessary in the future. The rainfall was described as a one-in-100-year event then gradually downgraded, but none of these pretexts are realistic. Questions arise over who is responsible for what, and how serious are the threats of rising sea level, more frequent adverse weather caused by climate change, and the “sinking of South Dunedin”, not to mention “retreat”.

Dunedin and environs have been subjected to much larger weather events in the past. Flooding of the entire city is well recorded and in particular photographs of the 1923 flood depict rowing in floodwaters in the city as well as inundation in South Dunedin. During a storm in 1898 large tracts of St Clair Esplanade were destroyed by the sea which damaged many houses, leaving some partly suspended. More recently, the storms of 1968 were greater than last year’s, delivering 10% more rainfall. In 1968 there were 90 properties invaded by floodwater, whereas last year some 1200 properties were flooded and many contaminated with effluent. Clearly last year’s event was exceptional only for the damage created and lives disrupted.

At a public meeting in South Dunedin on June 20, more than 12 months after the event, those affected had an opportunity to hear an explanation in the hope that someone might take responsibility for the extent of the damage. Despite a good representation of councillors there was no empathy and no likelihood of accountability. What the meeting heard was a long explanation of how the three-waters system works, or doesn’t work, as the case may be, and of failure at the pumping station from chief executive, Dr Sue Bidrose and other staff. The question is “when did the city’s councillors abdicate?”

South Dunedin June 2015 [radionz.co.nz]

It can be argued that the damage and distress was the result of neglect, but the DCC says problems at the pumping station added only 200mm to the flooding which would have occurred anyway. Which 200mm was it? Maybe the first 200mm flowed across the ground, reached blocked drains then deepened throughout the area, or perhaps the last 200mm increased the depth and entered homes and business premises carrying undesirable flotsam. Without the extra 200mm would the water have stopped at the thresholds rather than flowing inside?

What of the rising sea level threat? Is it as urgent and as devastating as the commissioner for the environment, some DCC councillors and the Green Party say? The Greens proffer that the Government should help to pay for the reconfiguration of South Dunedin. Why? There has been no disaster on the scale of the Canterbury earthquakes and there is no immediate danger condemning South Dunedin, for if sea level were to rise according to some projections, north Dunedin and other areas are also in jeopardy meaning protection on the coast is futile because the flat land would be inundated from the harbour.

Could it be that models of sea level rise around New Zealand are exaggerated and distorted by the multiplier effect have been grossly over stated? And do the $7 million apartment complex at the Esplanade to be completed next year and the DCC’s belated discussion on a South Dunedin hub indicate mixed messages on the subject?

There is no doubt that the infrastructure must be maintained to the highest level and upgrading implemented with haste. The seafront calls for a level-headed approach to protect the sandhills which shelter the city from the ocean. In the past a network of groynes captured the sand, maintaining a broad beach to dissipate the energy of the waves. The network succeeded for nearly 100 years, but without maintenance fell victim to the ocean, so is it time to reinstate a similar system and then plan carefully for the next 100 to 200 years?

Council says that infrastructure will require “tens of millions of dollars” we cannot afford, but plans to spend some $37 million on George Street and the Octagon, followed by development of the harbourside. These “tens of millions” surely must be re-allocated to South Dunedin for infrastructure, to build a second pumping station, and provide realistic coastal protection.

Dunedin needs new councillors who will make hard decisions, reduce spending on fripperies and attend to basics; people who are prepared to drill deep into reports and costings and who are not afraid to make unpalatable decisions when needed rather than govern with slogans and platitudes.

Declaration: Conrad Stedman is my nephew.

—

Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

Election Year. This post is offered in the public interest.

Calvert on DCC, ‘We could have a much more democratic and transparent operation of council’

Leunig Cartoons ‏@leunigcartoons · Aug 21

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### ODT Online Thu, 8 Sep 2016
Scope for more democracy with checks and balances
By Hilary Calvert
OPINION In the past three years Dunedin City Council has functioned just as central government does, with a government and an opposition. But the problem is that in Dunedin it means central government-style politics without the checks and balances. Because the mayor of the day is allowed to choose the chairs of the council committees, if the mayor anoints those who are similar in their views to him or her, effectively a “government” is formed. Those on the “government” side support each other, forming a version of the “cabinet”, with meetings between themselves alongside senior council staff to discuss the issues of the day. Those who are not part of this grouping are obliged to form a loose “opposition”, because this is the only place where any public challenges and questions are likely to come from.
In Dunedin […] the chairs of committees forming the “cabinet” meet secretly and without any minutes which can be accessed. They may be part of working parties with other groups, which never report back to the council, for example groups meeting with NZTA about cycleways. They may have information either before the rest of the council or outside the rest of council papers, never to be seen by council. […] In Dunedin, the ODT describes what happens in council meetings, talks to the chairs of the meetings, and prints press releases, having clarified the situation with a relevant staff member. There is little chance for any challenge of prevailing views unless a major debate happens during meetings, or unless the issues raised are ones which the ODT chooses to follow up in an in-depth way.
Read more

● Hilary Calvert is a Dunedin City councillor, who is not standing for re-election.

Leunig Cartoons ‏@leunigcartoons · Sep 8

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B L O W N ● O U T ● O F ● P R O P O R T I O N ● B Y ● C U L L

If, for example, the solutions involved “massive urban renewal or massive pumps” then Government help could be sought.

### ODT Online Fri, 9 Sep 2016
Work on South D issues
By Vaughan Elder
Dunedin Mayor Dave Cull says it is too early to make a formal approach to the Government for help with the problems facing South Dunedin. Mr Cull made the comments while outlining the council’s response to its vote last month to “immediately engage” the Government over the threat groundwater and sea-level changes pose to the low-lying area. Mr Cull said that in recent weeks he and chief executive Sue Bidrose briefed local MPs on the situation in South Dunedin and in the past he had spoken to ministers Bill English and Paula Bennett about the possibility of “collaboration” between local and central government in addressing South Dunedin’s issues.
Read more

The demise of the stacked cup towers. pic.twitter.com/ptti2qo3yz

— Animal Cognition (@animalcog) March 27, 2016

Animal Cognition @animalcog · Mar 27 [Birdie Cull, the wrecker]

—

Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

Election Year. This post is offered in the public interest.

Johnstone on ORC report : ‘The Natural Hazards of South Dunedin’ (July 2016)

█ The Natural Hazards of South Dunedin – July 2016 [read online]
Otago Regional Council
ISBN: 978-0-908324-35-4
Report writers:
Michael Goldsmith, ORC Natural Hazards Manager
Sharon Hornblow, ORC Natural Hazards Analyst
Reviewed by: Gavin Palmer, ORC Director Engineering, Hazards and Science
External review by: David Barrell, Simon Cox, GNS Science, Dunedin

—

Received from Neil Johnstone
Sun, 29 Aug 2016 at 8:17 p.m.

Message: Misinformation on the causes of the June 2015 South Dunedin flood have abounded since the event. As if the victimised residents haven’t suffered enough from others’ inactions (before and during the event), they are now being subjected to a hazards discovery process whose vigour appears to be exceeded only by its own recklessness. Following are a commentary of the hazards approach adopted by the Otago Regional Council (ORC), and a summary of my investigations into the flood event that I commenced after the publication of Dunedin City Council’s first flood report back in November 2015.

You can download Neil Johnstone’s report or read it below (formatted slightly differently to suit the WordPress template).

█ Download: A REVIEW OF ORC REPORT THE NATURAL HAZARDS OF SOUTH DUNEDIN (1) (PDF, 587 KB)

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AN APPRAISAL OF RECENT REPORTING OF SOUTH DUNEDIN HAZARDS

N.P JOHNSTONE, BEng (Civil), MIPENZ

1. Introduction

There is some irony that DCC and ORC should be planning “drop in” sessions for residents in respect of South Dunedin hazard issues during September 2016, some 15 months after the major flood. The prime cause of flooding in June 2015 was DCC’s failure to maintain its infrastructure (not just mudtanks), and its failure to operate its pump stations to their intended capacities. The subsequent spread of misconceptions (i.e. groundwater levels, rainfall significance etc) surrounding the flood causes was at least partly due to inaccurate ORC analyses and reporting.

Repetitive and new doubtful information emanating from ORC via its latest report has been noted. Presentations and an over-simplistic video production have been observed. A footnote covering these observations is included at the end of this appraisal.

Long-delayed DCC reports on causes of the South Dunedin flooding have already been strongly criticised by the author. Specifically discredited are misrepresentations of sea level, groundwater and rainfall ranking. Accepted now by DCC as factors (somewhat grudgingly, and depending on the audience) are mudtank blockage and Portobello Road pump station failures (plural); still to be fully acknowledged are the failures at Musselburgh Pumping Station.

Attention is now turned to significant parts of hazard reports produced by the Otago Regional Council and utilised by DCC.

2. Coastal Otago Flood Event 3 June 2015 (ORC, published October 2015)

This report deals with a wider area than South Dunedin. It is apparent that ORC staff never visited the flooding areas of South Dunedin on 3 June, but took advantage of fine weather to take some water level readings the following day. The opportunity for useful progressive surface water level recording was thus lost. Levels were collected at some 150 points on 4 June. ORC’s main conclusion was that “localised variations in topography were probably the main driver of flood depth”. Or, put another way, water depth was deepest where the ground was lowest. This seems hardly surprising, and even trivial. No attempt was made to explain the photographic images presented of extensive ponding remaining well after the rains had ceased. The phenomena of blocked mudtanks and unutilised pumping capacity went seemingly unnoticed.

The report does usefully reference ORC’s four borehole recorders of groundwater, but makes the somewhat misleading assessment that groundwater levels were “elevated” prior to the rainstorm. This misinformation was seized upon by agencies such as DCC and the Office of the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment to highlight climate change impacts.

Having obtained the actual groundwater level data from ORC via the LGOIMA process, the author was able to reveal this “groundwater fallacy” in reviews from February 2016, but it was not until the publication of NZ Listener’s article (June 11-17, 2016) entitled ‘FLOOD FIASCO’ that ORC admitted that pre-flood groundwater levels were in fact “just a little bit above average”. ORC now seems intent on resurrecting this fallacy.

The ORC report fails to address the real and key issues of pumping station failures (Portobello Road and Musselburgh), or comparisons with much lesser flood impacts in the larger rainfall event of March 8/9 1968.

The report states that the 2015 24-hour rainfall was the largest since 1923. This was patently incorrect, but again was utilised by DCC to divert blame from their role in the disaster.

3. The Natural Hazards of South Dunedin (ORC, published July 2016)

The report states unambiguously in its Opening Summary that the major flooding of June 2015 was “a result of heavy rainfall, surface runoff, and a corresponding rise in groundwater”. By now, most people are aware that the causes of the flooding’s disastrous impact were failure to optimally operate pumping stations, failure to clear mudtanks, and failure to deploy staff to key areas during the event. Again, none of these factors is addressed in ORC’s report.

The report presents a table on its second page entitled “Factors Which Can Influence Flood Hazard”. Examples of exaggerated negativity include:

1. Heavy Rainfall:
– Many recorded instances of rainfall leading to surface flooding.
– Heavy rainfall events have occurred frequently over the last decade.

Comment: These conclusions do not appear to be supported by the report’s text, and are vague, factually challengeable and alarmist. Prior to 2015, no major flooding had occurred in South Dunedin since 1968, and even that was minor by comparison.

2. Sea Level:
– Groundwater level fluctuates (by up to 0.5m near the coast) on a twice-daily cycle in response to normal ocean tides.

Comment: All of South Dunedin is near the coast; most of the area does not experience such large fluctuations. This should have been made clear by the inclusion of groundwater data from all 4 ORC sites across the plain, not just from Kennedy Street.

3. Seismic:
– Large earthquakes could result in increased flood hazard on the South Dunedin plain, due to liquefaction-related land subsidence or direct, sudden, changes in land elevation relative to sea level.

Comment: All areas of NZ have some susceptibility to earthquake damage. Dunedin is amongst the areas at lowest risk; no incidences of even minor liquefaction have ever been reported in South Dunedin, and little or no clearly liquefiable materials have been identified (Refer GNS, 2014*).

Cull’s city council is Not democracy : VOTE CULL OUT

PAINT BOMBERS WANTED. Apply here.
Dave Cull’s marketer, Ms Firebrand, is using LOL “brand” recognition to attempt to Fire up and Win over the Good Voters of South Dunedin. Was it a $7,000 billing on the railway viaduct entry to King Edward Street. Rhetorical. Cull has already LOST South Dunedin. Better spent on Lobotomy. Any mayor who Floods You or lowers Your Private Property Values is Not To Be Trusted EVER. Parade Cull at dawn to the public stocks. YOU OWE Dave Cull NOTHING except Projectile rotten eggs and rancid tomatoes.

—

Meanwhile….
A new mayoral candidate, in 2016, with No Previous Experience on the city council thinks he should run the city council like a Rugby Team.

What ‘BUSINESS'(!) does he have representing Ratepayers and Residents for the next trimester —given how Professional Rugby has Rorted Dunedin down to the Last Dollar, multiple times over. We all know how a stadium draws ‘tourism’.

WHO IS HE ?
Solve the mystery.

****

F O R C E D ● L O C A L ● G O V E R N M E N T ● R E F O R M S

Such companies, like Delta or City Forests in Dunedin, would operate along more corporate lines and at arm’s length from the councils that owned them.

so what’s new $$$$$$$$………….. ?

Sat, 27 Aug 2016 – Chris Morris
ODT: Fight for local democracy
At their heart, the [National government-led local government] reforms sought to promote greater efficiency through the use of council-controlled organisations (CCOs). […] But, worryingly for some councils, the Local Government Commission would have the power to create and impose “multi-council” regional CCOs that operated across traditional council boundaries. That could include “pre-approved” regional water and transport CCOs, responsible for everything from local roads and public transport to water delivery, such as Auckland’s Watercare. The commission would also have the power to transfer existing council assets — in some cases built up over generations — to the ownership and control of the new entities.

█ ODT: Criticism ‘just electioneering’

—

Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

Election Year. This post is offered in the public interest.

*Image: scarfyblog.co.nz + mylifemysite.com – Cull paint bombed
[tweaked by whatifdunedin]

South Dunedin mainstreet Hub : no direct relevance to distant Gasworks

as well as (pre-Election)
DESPICABLE DCC / ORC CLIMATE CHANGE MASSAGE

[click to enlarge]
DCC Webmap – GREAT DISTANCE except by computer or Segway….
South Dunedin | from King Edward St (red) to Gasworks Museum (blue) via Lorne and Braemar Sts (green) – colour overlays by whatifdunedin.

—

█ DCC doesn’t need Athfield Architects to justify the LONG DURATION need and solution. No disrespect to colleague, the late Ian Athfield —or the current firm (love them heaps).

DCC, DO NOT OVER THINK THIS, FOR CRISSAKES
Give South Dunedin a community facility as was Promised YEARS AGO. Leave the goodie-two-shoes Gasworks Museum lobbyists out of it, or very much to the side. They mean well, but for too long they’ve been praying on the feckless DCC, soaking up Ratepayer dollars with little justification, and they keep wanting more.

COLLECTIVELY, WE HAVE LOCAL SOLUTIONS – WE DON’T NEED TO BE HELD BY THE HAND TO SET UP SOMETHING SO INCREDIBLY SIMPLE AS AN ECONOMICAL WELL-CRAFTED COMMUNITY HUB IN KING EDWARD STREET

How many people is this “out of control” Dunedin City Council wanting to Massage – BEFORE the October Local Body Elections.

VOTE BUYING
The CULL Stench around this is SO DISGUSTING.

—

Dunedin City Council – Media Release
Drop-in sessions start of community conversation on South Dunedin’s future

This item was published on 22 Aug 2016

A series of drop-in information sessions hosted by the Dunedin City Council and Otago Regional Council early next month are the start of a community conversation around South Dunedin’s future. The sessions will be at the Dunedin Gasworks Museum on Thursday, 1 September and Friday, 2 September.

DCC chief executive Sue Bidrose will be presenting information about what happened in the 2015 flood, how the current stormwater system works, and how the DCC plans to invest and work with the community in the future.

Ms Bidrose said that it was important to plan carefully for South Dunedin’s changing environment. It was also important to take the time to involve the community in the decision making along the way, rather than to just do things on their behalf.

“Addressing the challenges of the future requires the DCC and ORC starting to have conversations with the community about the challenges, and the expectations and options for what can be achieved. The rest of Dunedin’s population needs to be involved as well. There is a great opportunity to turn some of the challenges into opportunities and give confidence for long-term investment in the area. These drop-in sessions are the beginning of the process. The DCC will be actively seeking local people’s thoughts on these issues and working with the ORC on what the long-term responses might be. I’m looking forward to seeing as many people as possible from the South Dunedin area at the sessions.” –Bidrose [employed by ????]

ORC director of stakeholder engagement Caroline Rowe said the drop-in sessions were part of a wider South Dunedin community engagement plan, aimed at developing a conversation with locals and groups about managing the risks associated with the changing environment. Ms Rowe said they follow the recent release of the ORC’s Natural Hazards of South Dunedin report. The [BULLSHIT ORC] technical report pulls together information and analysis gathered over the past seven years on natural hazards facing the area, particularly the increased likelihood of surface flooding associated with rising sea level. [FALSE AND MISLEADING BULLSHIT]

Presentations, with accompanying video, will be at each session and people will have an opportunity to talk individually to staff from both councils. The hour-long sessions will be repeated several times, with Thursday sessions starting at 10am, 11.30am, 1pm, 4.30pm and 7pm. The Friday sessions will start at 10am, 11.30am, and 1pm.

Ongoing engagement planned for the next few weeks also includes briefings for support service agencies and other specific interest groups such as the South Dunedin Business Association, the Otago Chamber of Commerce, and school and early childhood centres.

Contact Sue Bidrose, chief executive DCC on 03 477 4000.

DCC Link

█ Feedback on the proposal can be provided online on the council’s website at http://www.dunedin.govt.nz/council-online/currently-consulting-on/current-consultations/south-dunedin-community-hub

The feedback period runs from Saturday, 20 August until 4pm on Monday, 29 August.

****

Mon, 22 Aug 2016
ODT: South D hub proposal unveiled
The Dunedin City Council is calling for feedback from residents on its preferred option for a library and community hub in South Dunedin before a report is presented to councillors next month. Council services and development general manager Simon Pickford and architect Jon Rennie, of Athfield Architects, presented the council’s preferred option to about 50 people at the Dunedin Gasworks Museum on Saturday morning. Under the $5.25 million proposal, a library would be built in the former BNZ building in King Edward St and the facility linked to the Gasworks Museum through Lorne St. Some facilities, such as a café, would be based at the museum. Mr Pickford said residents had until August 29 to provide feedback to the council on the proposal.

█ For more, enter the terms *south dunedin*, *flood*, *hazard*, *vandervis* (sane) and *cull* (VOTE Cull OUT) in the search box at right.

—

Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

Election Year. This post is offered in the public interest.

ORC, DCC continuing Deceptions : Natural Hazards for #SouthDunedin

W H A T ● P L A N ?

ORC stakeholder engagement director Caroline Rowe said the sessions were part of a wider “South Dunedin community engagement plan”.

### ODT Online Tue, 9 Aug 2016
Sessions on natural hazards
By John Gibb
South Dunedin residents will be able to learn more about natural hazards facing the area through drop-in sessions to be held at the Dunedin Gasworks Museum early next month.
The Otago Regional Council is organising the September 1 and 2 sessions, in collaboration with the Dunedin City Council. The drop-in session on the first day will run from 1.30pm to 7pm, and on the second day from 10am to 2.30pm.
Last month the ORC released a report titled “Natural Hazards of South Dunedin”. This report consolidated information and analysis gathered over the past seven years on the natural hazards facing the area, particularly the “increased likelihood of surface flooding associated with rising sea level”.
Read more

—

W H A T ● R I S K S ?
Answer ……. M I S I N F O R M A T I O N via ORC Hazard Plans and Maps

F I G H T >>> To Protect Your Property Values

“In a report to be tabled at the ORC’s technical committee tomorrow, Ms Rowe said South Dunedin was “an integral part of the wider Dunedin community” and many people and groups had an interest in how its risks would be managed. The report said the ORC also planned several other communication activities over the hazards plan, this month and next.” –ODT

—

█ ORC : Combined Council Agenda 10 August – Public.pdf
● Go to Agenda Item 5 (pp 34-35)
2016/0988 South Dunedin Community Engagement Report
The report outlines the approach management is taking to the community engagement as was verbally communicated at the Technical Committee meeting held on 20 July 2016 where Council received the report entitled “The Natural Hazards of South Dunedin” and made the decision to “endorse further community and stakeholder engagement within a timely manner”.

[screenshot – click to enlarge]

—

General reading (Otago including Dunedin City District)
● ORC : Natural Hazards

● Information coming to this ORC webpage: ORC committee report – natural hazards of the Dunedin district: technical documents

● Natural Hazards of South Dunedin – July 2016

● See also, the DCC second generation district plan (2GP) hazard zone information and maps based on ORC data, via the 2GP Index page.

—

Related Post and Comments:
6.8.16 LGOIMA trials and tribulations with peer reviews #SouthDunedinflood

█ For more, enter the terms *flood*, *hazard*, *south dunedin* and *southdunedinflood* in the search box at right.

—

Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

Election Year. This post is offered in the public interest.

Informed : Flurry of cycleway chills at Dunedin

A very inventive cycling snowman installation in Dunedin! :-) (via Dunedin News) pic.twitter.com/wYZGALoFJr

— Dave Goosselink (@davedunedin) August 5, 2016

—

Meanwhile, when in warmer parts.

Received from John Evans
Sun, 31 Jul 2016 at 11:42 p.m.

█ Subject: Up to date report on cycleway usage in Australia

After an extensive second trip to examine the use of cycleways in Australia, I can report that there are now more cyclists than I saw at this time last year.

Queensland:
I saw three cyclists in three weeks in Queensland in areas including the Sunshine Coast and Brisbane.
Not one of them was using a cycleway.

New South Wales:
Up until today in two weeks I saw only two cyclists.
Today I took my son and grandson fishing at Kuringai Chase National Park.
There were no cyclists on Pennant Hills road or Highway One.
However, on the road into the national park all of a sudden there was a surfeit of cyclists. 24 in total!

All of them happily riding up and down the hill to the estuary. But surprise, surprise, none of them were using a cycleway. The pesky varmints just keep riding their bikes where they want to go, not where the bureaucrats want to herd them.

What does this tell us.
Cyclists have different intentions when they get on their bikes. They all do not want to go to the same place.

Therefore there are only two choices. No cycleways (a complete saving) or cycleways on every road (a complete waste of money).

One must question just why council employees believe that cyclists will be governed by bureaucrats.

This forensic cycle seeking trip was funded by the Otakou division of the harbour cycleways investigation bureau. A thinktank investigating illogical decisions by councils. This body has so far spent too much time on cycleways, but the inane decisions by various New Zealand and Australian councils need more evaluation. To that end our representative will be travelling over 2000 km seeking cyclists from Sydney to Melbourne to Hobart. We shall report on these investigations later.

[ends]

█ For more, enter the terms *cycle*, *cycleway*, *cycling* or *bicycle* in the search box at right.

—

Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

Election Year. This post is offered in the public interest.

Labour messing with South Dunedin, like Cull, unbidden

Not Listening [octavehighereast.com]

—

There is little or no RISING GROUNDWATER at South Dunedin – this is an attack on the local community by Anthropogenic Global Warming (manmade climate change) believers like Curran, Clark, and Cull.

So-called ‘authorities’ are running their Politics over the top of the local Community, Failing to canvass the views of the local residents, property owners, service providers and businesses through agreed consultation methods Before pronouncing upon the area. This is disrespectful, dangerous behaviour. Unwarranted.

A lot of us will remember Labour MP David Clark’s importune speech on climate change at the public meeting held at South Dunedin on 20 June. He completely didn’t register the mood and understandings of the local audience.

Greenie Cull and the Labour Party are deliberately or inadvertently using South Dunedin as a Political Football. There are few votes to be earned from bullying and interference, thank god.

Listening —what is that.

—

Speaking after the tour, Mr Little said the area was a “prime candidate” for urban renewal under the party’s proposed Affordable Housing Authority.

### ODT Online Tue, 26 Jul 2016
Labour timeline for South renewal
By Timothy Brown
South Dunedin’s renewal will be showing “good progress” within six years of electing a Labour government, party leader Andrew Little says. Mr Little toured South Dunedin with Dunedin Mayor Dave Cull, Dunedin South MP Clare Curran, Dunedin North MP Dr David Clark and list MP David Parker after the area was earmarked by the Opposition as one urgently needing urban renewal. The group walked from Bathgate Park School, in Macandrew Rd, down Loyalty St into Nicholson St and on to Nelson St before returning to the school. They were accompanied by members of various social groups from South Dunedin.
Read more

****

### Dunedintv.co.nz Mon, 25 July 2016
Labour leader tours South Dunedin
Labour Leader Andrew Little has visited South Dunedin today, alongside a contingent of MPs and social service agency stakeholders. The group wandered around the areas hardest hit by last year’s floods, looking at the handful of houses still empty more than a year on. And Little took the opportunity to offer up his party’s plan to fix some of the issues.
Ch39 Link

Channel 39 Published on Jul 24, 2016
Labour leader tours South Dunedin

—

DUNEDIN – JUNKET CITY FOR LGNZ
“How do we Efficiently capture NZ Ratepayers’ Money for our Comfy Salaries”

### Dunedintv.co.nz Mon, 25 July 2016
Local government conference kicks off
The country’s annual Local Government conference is back in Dunedin for the first time in almost a decade. More than 560 delegates have piled into the Town Hall to discuss how to make New Zealand a better place to live and work. But it’s also serving as a way to address the tension between local and central governments.
Ch39 Video

LAWRENCE YULE GO HOME

█ For more, enter the terms *flood*, *sea level rise*, *stormwater*, *hazard*, *johnstone*, *hendry*, *south dunedin action group*, *debriefing notes*, *listener* or *lgnz* in the search box at right.

—

Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

Election Year. This post is offered in the public interest.

*Images: mrhudyma.com – Listening | linkedin.com – Larry King, Listen

Sea level change : implications for coastal management

Link and Summary received from Rosemary McQueen
Wed, 6 Jul 2016 at 1:54 p.m.

The New Zealand Climate Science Coalition
Commonsense about climate change Link

Two of Our Coalition Members Reveal the True Facts about Sea Levels
Posted Mon, 4 Jul 2016
“In this short and accessible monograph, Willem de Lange and Robert Carter describe and explain sea-level change, including the many remaining uncertainties in our full understanding of what exactly drives this change, and discuss the implications, mainly regarding coastal management. The monograph is intended for policy makers, but it should be informative for any educated reader. De Lange and Carter analyse the causes of sea-level change, and describe how it has been measured – with tide gauges over the past 100 to 150 years and from satellites over the past 30 years. Their key message is to recall that sea-level change is a local phenomenon, with high variability and multiple causes.”
Professor Vincent Courtillot writes this in his foreword to the Global Waming Policy Foundation paper by which our Coalition members, Dr Willem De Lange and the late Professor Bob Carter rebut alarmist propaganda about rises in sea levels and what causes those levels to rise and fall.

█ SEA-LEVEL CHANGE : Living with uncertainty
By Willem P de Lange and Robert M Carter
Foreword by Professor Vincent Courtillot
http://www.thegwpf.org/content/uploads/2014/05/Sea-level-report.pdf

SUMMARY [from the paper]

1. Global sea-level corresponds to a notional world-wide average and is determined by the interaction between the volume of the ocean basins, the volume of water that they contain and the effect of Earth’s gravitational field.

2. Change in global sea-level is caused by:
• a change in ocean basin volume, controlled by geological forces
• a change in seawater density, resulting from variations in ocean temperature or salinity;
• the addition or subtraction of water from the ocean by the melting and freezing of glaciers and ice-caps.

Global sea-level is estimated using averaged measurements from a worldwide network of coastal tide-gauges or from satellite-borne instruments. Because they represent a worldwide average, neither of these figures has any useful application to coastal management in specific locations. Instead, a knowledge of local relative sea-level change, as measured at specific coastal locations, is the basis for practical coastal management. Local sea-levels are rising or falling in different parts of the world, depending upon the direction and rate of movement of the underlying land (tectonic change).

3. Sea-level change is mainly a coastal management issue, but the position of sea-level is only one of several important factors that controls the position and changes in the disposition of the shoreline. Other important forces and controls that have to be considered include:
• the rise or fall of the land
• the supply of sediment
• the weather and climate (short and long-term temperature, wind, rainfall)
• the oceans (waves, tides, storms, tsunami)
• erosion and gravitational collapse (for cliffed shorelines).

4. In its natural state, a sedimentary shoreline may shift landwards or seawards by metres to many tens of metres over periods between days and decades. In the past, coastal inhabitants have adapted to such changes, and trying to prevent them by controlling the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is neither practical nor cost-effective.

5. Coral atolls depend upon the interaction of a shallow ocean sea floor(generally the top of a submerging volcano), the growth and erosion of a coral reef, and the natural forces of winds, waves and tides. The integrity of an atoll is constantly under threat from entirely natural erosive forces. On top of this, human activities such as sand mining, construction project loading and groundwater withdrawal all cause local lowering of the ground surface, and thereby encourage marine incursion. It is this human interference, in combination with episodic natural hazards like tides and storms, and not global sea-level change that provides the alarming footage of marine flooding on atolls that from time to time appears on television news screens.

6. Changes in sea-level over long periods of time (millions of years) are inferred from geological evidence. These long-term changes suggest that any sea-level rises in response to temperature increases decelerate rather than accelerate over time. Such changes also indicate a maximum rate and duration of natural sea-level rise of about 30 mm/y over periods of a century or so.

7. Based on these geological studies, it appears that slow global sea-level rise– typically less than 10 mm/y – has been taking place over the last 10,000 y. At specific localities, this rising trend interacts with changing land levels due to a range of geological processes and multi-decadal climatic oscillations to produce different patterns of local relative sea-level change throughout the world – in some places rising, in others static and in others falling.

8. The long-term tide-gauge data record a 20th century average global sea-level rise of about +1–2 mm/y. It is established by many studies, too, that over the last 150 years global sea-level has been rising at an average rate of about 1.8 mm/y, which is inferred to represent the slow continuation of a melting of the ice sheets that began about 17,000 years ago.

9. Based on the same records, the IPCC has estimated an average rate of global rise between 1900 and 2000 of 1.6 mm/y (2007; 4th Assessment Report) or between 1901 and 2010 of 1.7±0.2 mm/y (2013; 5th Assessment Report). This global average ignores both short-term and multi-decadal changes in sea-level that are known to be associated with meteorological and oceanographic oscillations, and the local and regional effects of land movement. These additional factors are likely to continue to be important for future sea levels, and so should be considered in conjunction with projections of global sea level. The dominance of such processes in sea-level change means that for environmental management purposes sea-level changes should be assessed at local to regional scales, and not globally.

10. Satellite measurements of global sea-level have only been available since 1992, and the technology is therefore in its infancy. Complex computation and statistical analysis is required to transform raw satellite measurements into a sea-level curve, including the correction and piecing together of records collected over many years by ageing, and ultimately different, satellite vehicles. In recent years, it has been claimed on the basis of satellite measurements that the rate of sea-level rise since 1992 is greater than 3 mm/y – twice that measured using tide-gauge data for earlier periods, although the IPCC’s 5th Assessment Report considers it likely that similar rates occurred between 1930 and 1950. This apples-to-oranges comparison has formed the basis of claims that the rate of rise is accelerating, as required by the global warming hypothesis.

11. Most policy discussions regarding sea-level change are conducted in terms of computer modelled projections, rather than of factual information. In its 4th Assessment Report in 2007, the IPCC used physics-based computer simulations of the Earth and its climate to project a rise of sea-level of between 18 and 59 cm by 2100. The bottom end of this range corresponds with the 18-cm rise in sea-level predicted by empirical models and matches the long-term tide-gauge rate of rise of 1.8 mm/y.

12. Semi-empirical models produce the highest and most alarming estimates of rates of future sea-level change so far published (between 0.8 and 1.8 m by 2100). Strong controversy exists over the likely accuracy and policy usefulness of these results. Given that both empirical and deterministic modelling yield more modest projec- tions of future sea-level, the semi-empirical models can at best only be viewed as a work in progress.

13. The IPCC estimates that 1.1 mm of the 20th century sea-level rise of 1.8 mm/y can be accounted for by the combined effects of continuing ice melt (~0.7 mm/y) and ocean expansion due to warming (~0.4 mm/y), with the remaining ~0.7 mm/y relating to dynamic oceanographic and meteorological factors. The relatively small contribution from melt water indicates that there is no scientific basis for the claim that global warming will imminently melt so much ice that sea levels will rise dra- matically; by 20 ft in the imagination of Al Gore (Gore, 2006) or by 5 m in that of Jim Hansen (Hansen, 2007; Hansen and Sato, 2012).

CONCLUSIONS

Current global sea-level policy, supported by many governments, is to reduce the quantity of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere in order to slow a global warming that is apparently no longer happening, in a vain attempt to reduce the rate of global sea-level rise. This policy attempts to moderate a theoretical environmental variable, ignores local sea-level and coastal management realities, is ineffectual in significantly reducing sea-level rise and is not cost effective compared to incremental adaptation.

Global sea-level policy as currently practiced by governments is therefore scientifically uncertain and both financially and politically unsustainable.

POLICY RECOMMENDATIONS

Based on the material presented in this paper we recommend the implementation of three policy guidelines.

● Abandonment of ‘let’s stop global sea-level rise’ policies: No justification exists for continuing to base sea-level policy and coastal management regulation upon the outcomes of speculative deterministic or semi-empirical sea-level modelling. Even were the rate of global sea-level change able to be known accurately, the practice of using a notional global rate of change to manage specific coastal locations worldwide is irrational, and should be abandoned.

● Recognition of the local or regional nature of coastal hazard: Most coastal hazard is intrinsically local in nature. Other than periodic tsunami and exceptional storms, it is the regular and repetitive local processes of wind, waves, tides and sediment supply that fashion the location and shape of the shorelines of the world. Yes, local relative sea-level is an important determinant, but in some localities that is rising and in others falling. Accordingly, there is no ‘one size fits all’ sea-level curve or policy that can be applied. Crucially, coastal hazard needs to be managed in the context of regional and local knowledge, using data gathered by site-specific tide-gauges and other relevant instrumentation.

● Use of planning controls that are flexible and adaptive in nature: Many planning regulations already recognize the dynamic nature of shorelines, for example by applying minimum building setback distances or heights from the tidemark. In addition, engineering solutions (groynes, breakwaters, sea-defence walls) are often used in attempts to stabilise a shoreline. To the degree that they are both effective and environmentally acceptable, such solutions should be encouraged. Nevertheless, occasional damage will continue to be imposed from time to time by large storms or other unusual natural events, and that no matter how excellent the pre-existing coastal engineering and planning controls may be. In these circumstances, the appropriate policy should be one of careful preparation for, and adaptation to, hazardous events as and when they occur.

It is the height of folly, and waste of money, to attempt to ‘control’ the size or frequency of damaging natural events by expecting that reductions in human carbon dioxide emissions will moderate climate ‘favourably’ – whether that be putatively sought from a moderation in the frequency and intensity of damaging natural events or by a reduction in the rate of global average sea-level rise itself.

—

Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

Election Year. This post is offered in the public interest.

*Image: clipartpal.com – Hippo

Johnstone disputes Opus review #SouthDunedinFlood

### ODT Online Thu, 7 Jul 2016
Flood review clears DCC staff findings
Dunedin City Council staff have been vindicated by peer reviews which backed their findings over the cause of last June’s devastating floods. The reviews, carried out by infrastructure consultancy firm Opus, backed the council’s findings South Dunedin and other parts of the city would have been flooded even if the city’s stormwater system was running at full capacity.
Read more

Opus peer reviews of DCC flood reports received (same day) following a LGOIMA request made on 7 July 2016:

DCC Nov2015 rpt review-final (PDF, 395 KB)

DCC Apr2016 rpt review-final (PDF, 329 KB)

****

A truly independent inquiry into the council’s performance around last year’s South Dunedin floods remains long overdue, writes Dunedin engineer Neil Johnstone.

### ODT Online Thu, 14 Jul 2016
Opinion: Report skims surface of South Dunedin flood saga
By Neil Johnstone
OPINION Readers of the Dunedin City Council-funded independent peer review of its post-flood reporting (ODT, 7.7.16) should be wary. The council’s delight with the review may prove short-lived. In brief, the Opus review:

● Recognises the 1968 rainfall event was bigger than that of June 2015 (contrary to repeated council claims).
● Fails to explore the reasons why the 2015 flood was a disaster, and the 1968 event was not.
● Makes assumptions about groundwater levels without referencing the actual data.
● Appears to consider the council’s assumption of zero ground infiltration has merit (note: the data disproves this).
● Believes mud-tank blockage impacts of the flood were “localised” (too bad if you were a local), but fails to consider the likely widespread impacts on South Dunedin of blocked mud-tanks in the St Clair catchment.
● States council reviews “suggest” its failures at the Portobello Rd pumping station caused an increase in flood levels of about 200mm.
● In fact, the first council review leaves the reader with no more than an opportunity to infer this, while the second council review only states that the failures may have influenced “the length of time flooding was evident”.
● I do not recall the council actually publicly admitting the 200mm figure before the South Dunedin Action Group meeting of June 21.
● Fails to address the flood impacts of the council’s total failure to operate its Musselburgh pumps for stormwater relief.
● Makes general statements to the effect that “primary” flooding would have occurred under any circumstance. South Dunedin residents know that “overwhelming” of stormwater infrastructure was not the concern; the avoidable flooding of our people’s houses and businesses was.

For all of the above reasons, and more, the Opus finding the council report’s conclusions were “robust” is concerning. A truly independent inquiry into the council’s performance pre, during and post-flood, at staff and political levels, is long overdue. ODT Link

—

Related Posts and Comments:
● 7.7.16 Where is the unreserved DCC apology to … South Dunedin ?
● 4.7.16 Presentations available —a) 4 July USA —b) 20 June SDAG
● 28.6.16 The Star and RNZ on raised flood levels #SouthDunedin
● 27.6.16 CULL commingled #AGWbullsfeatherartists
● 21.6.16 Mayoral Statement to South Dunedin
● 20.6.16 Public Meeting: South Dunedin Action Group #tonight
18.6.16 South Dunedin stormwater pipes —getting past the desktop ICMP
● 17.6.16 So we’re going to play it this way #SouthDunedinFlood
● 16.6.16 Public Meeting: South Dunedin Action Group #AllWelcome
● 6.6.16 Listener June 11-17 2016 : Revisiting distress and mismanagement
6.5.16 South Dunedin Action Group: Notes of meeting with DCC (3 May 2016)
14.4.16 South Dunedin flood risk boosters #ClimateChangeCrap #PissOffPCE
26.2.16 Mudtanks and drains + Notice of Public Meeting #SouthDunedinFlood
● 31.12.15 2016, have mercy !@$#%^&*
10.4.15 DCC: Natural Hazards

*Bullet points indicate comments entered after the public meeting 20 June.

█ For more, enter the terms *flood*, *sea level rise*, *stormwater*, *hazard*, *johnstone*, *opus*, *hendry*, *south dunedin action group*, *debriefing notes* or *listener* in the search box at right.

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Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

Election Year. This post is offered in the public interest.

Where is the unreserved DCC apology to the Community of South Dunedin ?

Updated post
Thu, 7 Jul 2016 at 5:45 p.m. [link to peer reviews via LGOIMA]

—

And where are the Opus International ‘peer reviews’ for public scrutiny.

All we have is the self-congratulatory propaganda from DCC and the motley crew, propagated by friends at ODT.

Flood review clears DCC staff findings

SHAME

We hear from inside DCC that the peer reviews are not up to much.

Opus, you say?

Hmm.

News. Farce. Like an incessant rash.

Reasons for political Removal.

—

Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

Election Year. This post is offered in the public interest.

Presentations available —a) 4 July USA —b) 20 June SDAG

Link received.
Mon, 4 Jul 2016 at 12:29 p.m.

Sam Eagle Uploaded on Jun 27, 2008
Stars & Stripes FOREVER!
I, Sam the Eagle, present a musical salute to America.
(c) 2009 The Muppets Studio, LLC

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From: [Dunedin City Council]
Sent: Monday, 4 July 2016 11:55 a.m.
To: Elizabeth Kerr
Subject: Response to Information Request

Dear Ms Kerr,

Official information request for CEO SPEECH SOUTH DUNEDIN

I refer to your official information request dated 27-June-2016 for “a full copy of DCC Chief Executive Sue Bidrose’s speech and overhead slides presented to the public meeting hosted by the South Dunedin Action Group on 20 June at Nations Church, King Edward St.”

The information you have requested is available on our website at:

Click to access SC2200115516062812500.pdf

If you wish to discuss this further with us, please feel free to contact the chief executive and request an appointment.

Yours sincerely

[Dunedin City Council]

Download: Sue Bidrose – South Dunedin and stormwater June 20 2016
(PDF, 1 MB)

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Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

Election Year. This post is offered in the public interest.

Ray Macleod, letter to editor

ODT 2.7.16 (page 30)

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Received from Lyndon Weggery
Tue, 21 June 2016 at 7:29 p.m.

Message: In the light of concerns last night [South Dunedin public meeting] about the effects of the Proposed 2GP on South Dunedin, suggest you extract the Hazard Zone portion and post it on What if?

South Dunedin Hazard Zone (PDF, 2 MB)

The following report by Anna Johnson shows that very little was done [public consultation] in 2014. In fact only 17 people turned up to the DCC workshop in South Dunedin and their Appendices show that less than 10 people commented on their draft natural hazard policy.

Preferred Options Report (1) (PDF, 2 MB)

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Related Posts and Comments:
● 28.6.16 The Star and RNZ on raised flood levels #SouthDunedin
● 27.6.16 CULL commingled #AGWbullsfeatherartists
● 23.6.16 Sa pièce de résistance @ #DUD
● 21.6.16 Mayoral Statement to South Dunedin
● 20.6.16 Public Meeting: South Dunedin Action Group #tonight
18.6.16 South Dunedin stormwater pipes —getting past the desktop ICMP
● 17.6.16 So we’re going to play it this way #SouthDunedinFlood
● 16.6.16 Public Meeting: South Dunedin Action Group #AllWelcome
● 6.6.16 Listener June 11-17 2016 : Revisiting distress and mismanagement
6.5.16 South Dunedin Action Group: Notes of meeting with DCC (3 May 2016)
14.4.16 South Dunedin flood risk boosters #ClimateChangeCrap #PissOffPCE
26.2.16 Mudtanks and drains + Notice of Public Meeting #SouthDunedinFlood
● 31.12.15 2016, have mercy !@$#%^&*
10.4.15 DCC: Natural Hazards

*Bullet points indicate comments entered after the public meeting 20 June.

█ For more, enter the terms *flood*, *sea level rise*, *climate change*, *pce*, *stormwater*, *hazard*, *johnstone*, *hendry*, *south dunedin action group*, *debriefing notes* or *listener* in the search box at right.

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Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

Election Year. This post is offered on the public interest.