No news : Appointment of Group CFO

****

Consternation of Various Sorts

We note the Dunedin City Council’s very poor financial position generally, in face of the ‘explosive’ DCC-owned Aurora/Delta collapse of the Otago power network – notable for continuing poor governance and management, with contingent lack of transparency and accountability – affecting ratepayers and residents in three distinct council areas (DCC, CODC, QLDC); the city council’s snail-like attendance to infrastructure maintenance and upgrades including implementation of three waters strategy; the city council’s ongoing out-of-control stadium fiasco; and ALL The Council Debt / debt servicing costs etc etc – for the very low, ever passive and aging ratepayer base.
FANTASTIC TIMES.

How interesting then that DCC has – as yet – failed to appoint a new Group Chief Financial Officer following the resignation of Grant McKenzie last year (see announcement 11 June 2016 via ODT).

****

Fri, 12 Aug 2016
ODT: Departure reshuffle
The departure of the Dunedin City Council’s group chief financial officer, Grant McKenzie, has triggered a minor reshuffle within the organisation. The rejig includes a temporary structure while Mr McKenzie’s replacement is recruited, but the council has also taken the opportunity to realign job titles and responsibilities for two of the council’s senior managers. […] Council financial controller Gavin Logie has also been named acting chief financial officer until Mr McKenzie’s replacement is named.

Sat, 11 Jun 2016
ODT: Sir Julian stands down, McKenzie appointed CEO
Sir Julian Smith, chairman and managing director of Allied Press, publisher of the Otago Daily Times, is stepping down from the day-to-day running of the company after nearly 40 years. Sir Julian (72), who will remain as chairman, told staff yesterday he has appointed Dunedin City Council group chief financial officer Grant McKenzie as the new Allied Press chief executive officer.

****

Dunedin City Council – Media Release
DCC Appoints Treasury Manager
This item was published on 10 Sep 2014
Richard Davey has been appointed to the new position of Dunedin City Council Treasury Manager. Mr Davey, who is originally from Dunedin, has had more than 21 years of banking experience in New Zealand and Australia. His experience centres on dealing with corporate treasuries and solving their risk management and funding issues. As Treasury Manager, Mr Davey will oversee Dunedin City Treasury Ltd – a DCC-owned company provides funding and financial services to other companies in the Dunedin City Holdings Ltd group. Mr Davey will report to Group Chief Financial Officer Grant McKenzie. Read more

Dunedin City Council – Media Release
Group Chief Financial Officer Appointed
This item was published on 14 Oct 2013
The University of Otago’s Director of Financial Services, Grant McKenzie, has been appointed as the Dunedin City Council’s Group Chief Financial Officer (GCFO). Announcing the appointment of Mr McKenzie to this newly-created role, DCC Chief Executive Paul Orders says, “Grant will bring a wealth of knowledge and experience to the role and will be instrumental in ensuring the effective and efficient management of DCC group finances.” […] The new position of Group Chief Financial Officer replaces the DCC’s Chief Financial Officer (currently a vacant post), with the role expanded to include the provision of financial advice and support to the Board of Dunedin City Holdings Limited (DCHL). The role will also create more cohesive financial management between the DCC and Dunedin City Holdings Limited. Twenty eight applications were received for the position, from New Zealand and overseas.
Read more

****

It seems DCC has slumped and trailed until 27 February (20 working days) to respond formally to my request for official information – with no phone call received (see postscript).

Tomorrow Monday is D-Day. No notice of extension has been received.

HOW HARD IS IT REALLY TO ANSWER BASIC QUESTIONS—
20 working days ? Get real DCC.

█ OFFICIAL INFORMATION REQUEST

From: [DCC Governance Support]
Sent: Friday, 3 February 2017 11:31 a.m.
To: Elizabeth Kerr
Subject: Acknowledgement of LGOIMA request

03-Feb-2017

Dear Ms Kerr,

Official information request for: APPOINTMENT OF GROUP CHIEF FINANCIAL OFFICER

Reference Number: 289707

I am writing to acknowledge receipt of your official information request dated 27-January-2017 for information regarding the APPOINTMENT OF GROUP CHIEF FINANCIAL OFFICER as follows:

1. When will the DCC appoint a Group Chief Financial Officer (GCFO) to replace Grant McKenzie ? 2. For what reason(s) has this appointment been delayed ? 3. Have applicants for the position been short-listed ? 4. Is there anything thing else DCC wants to say about the appointment process ?

We received your request on 27-January-2017. We will endeavour to respond to your request as soon as possible and in any event no later than 27-February-2017, being 20 working days after the day your request was received. If we are unable to respond to your request by then, we will notify you of an extension of that timeframe.

Your request is being handled by [Governance Support]. If you have any queries, please feel free to contact [Governance Support] on 03 477 4000. If any additional factors come to light which are relevant to your request, please do not hesitate to contact us so that these can be taken into account.

Yours sincerely

[Governance Support]

P.S. I have also sent your questions to our chief executive Sue Bidrose, as she may wish to provide an answer to you directly by phone or email.

Governance Support Officer
Dunedin City Council

Related Post and Comments:
10.6.16 g’bye & ’ello

—

Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

This post is offered in the public interest.

Let the Ombudsman recommend for democracy at SDHB

As we know, the slippery triumverate – Kathy Grant, Richard Thomson and Graham Crombie – have had a lot to answer for at both the SDHB and DCC/DCHL. An unsavoury grouping, best dissolved. Unfortunately, Health Minister Jonathan Coleman is not that bright.

—

### ODT Online Mon, 6 Feb 2017
SDHB restricts information access
By Eileen Goodwin
The Southern District Health Board is clamping down on information it has previously released without objection. Last week, the SDHB said it could no longer release commissioner Kathy Grant’s official correspondence unless the Otago Daily Times stated “specifically” which letters it is after. Previously, the board agreed to a general release of top-level inward and outward correspondence, subject to redactions to protect individual privacy. […] The ODT has also complained to the Office of the Ombudsman about the board’s response.
Read more

For more, enter the terms *sdhb*, *kathy grant* and *hospital* in the search box at right.

—

Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

This post is offered in the public interest.

Site Notice : Post removal

Updated

A new post published today, entitled ‘Council procurement policy falters’, has been removed at the urgent request of Richard Thomson, and separately, Graham McKerracher.

Sincere apologies to Mr Thomson and Mr Staynes for any referencing that appeared false or damaging.

The post was swiftly pulled at first notice.

Responses received this year from DCC via LGOIMA requests for information on Firebrand as a service supplier to various council entities are public domain. The general public can request this prepared and available information from DCC at any time.

The official information was originally supplied to independent requesters Elizabeth Kerr and Hilary Calvert.

—

Elizabeth Kerr
Site Owner

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.

LGOIMA trials and tribulations with peer reviews #SouthDunedinflood

The following letter has had names removed, except those previously cited by broadcast and print media (public domain). -Eds.

—

Received from Neil Johnstone
Fri, 5 Aug 2016 at 11:41 p.m.

Subject: DCC and the LGOIMA

Message: I have read concerning comments on your site regarding DCC’s apparent failure to comply with its LGOIMA obligations. You may wish to post my account of my recent experience.

[begins]

Dunedin City Council took ten months to produce its second Infrastructure Report, entitled ‘South Dunedin Public Infrastructure During June 2015 Flood Event Follow-Up’ (Author: R. Stokes). On 28 January 2016 (still three months before the report surfaced), then DCC Group Manager Transport Ian McCabe told the Otago Daily Times “the lengthy timeline was needed to ensure the report was robust, including an external peer review of its findings”. Mr McCabe went on to emphasise that “the report had been widened from an initial focus only on mudtank maintenance, and now also included a fresh look at the network’s design capacity”. That all seemed fair enough.

When the report was ultimately released in late April 2016, it contained no reference to any external (or other) peer review. However, when interviewed by John Campbell on Radio NZ’s Checkpoint programme on April 22, shortly after the Report’s release, Mayor Cull repeatedly referenced “independent” peer review(s) as supporting (“parts of”) the Report’s content. Mr Cull stated that he didn’t know which parts of the report had been reviewed independently. “You would have to talk to her (Ms Stokes) about that,” he said. Presumably, therefore, he hadn’t seen the review(s) either.

On 17 May I sent a LGOIMA request to DCC Chief Executive Sue Bidrose, asking for a copy of the review(s). On 20 May I received an acknowledgement from DCC which rather defeated the purpose of my request but, more importantly, indicated that I would receive a response asap, but within 20 working days. I immediately queried why it should take such a long time to simply send a copy of a recent review, and asked simply for confirmation whether the review actually existed.

This time I received an email from the Group Manager Corporate Services suggesting a “discussion” before they left for overseas. There was no mention of my straightforward query as to whether the review actually existed. I replied immediately, and asked again for a simple yes/no to that question. Again, the question was not answered.

A full month (the maximum allowable period of 20 working days having elapsed since my simple request) later, I received an email from DCC. They were able to report that they had received information from the General Manager Infrastructure and Networks thus: “The response to Mr Johnstone is that we have had a peer review done, however this is still in draft and yet to be finalised (as staff have been focusing on forward work demands, and we have staff away). Once the review is finalised it will be publicly released.” “Therefore we have decided to refuse your request under section 17(d) of the Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act, as the information requested will soon be publically (sic) available.”

I considered that response was unsatisfactory. The review, apparently under belated construction, was clearly not what I had repeatedly requested. I should by then have received the review referenced by Messrs McCabe (“external”) and Cull (“independent”), or received an acknowledgement that it did not exist.

Then on the evening of 6 July I was emailed by the General Manager Infrastructure and Networks, a copy of a new review, seemingly hot off the press, and authored by Opus in Auckland. This obviously was not the review that I had requested back on 17 May, as all DCC personnel involved should have known.

On 9 July I wrote to Chief Executive Sue Bidrose, expressing my concerns. I asked the following key questions:

Why, almost two months after my original LGOIMA request, I had still not received an admission that the peer review sought did not in fact exist?
Or, alternatively, if it did exist, why had it not been provided?
Why it took a month after my initial request for me to be merely told (irrelevantly) that a (different) peer review was being prepared, but with no attempt to satisfy my simple, legitimate request?

Almost a week later, a DCC officer returned to the list of respondents. They advised that my (follow-up) enquiry was being treated as a new request, and (you all know the drill) would be dealt with as soon as possible, but within 20 working days of receipt at the latest.

Nineteen working days later I received an emailed response from a Manager Civic and Legal. None of the three questions (above) were answered. They stated that my enquiries had been answered as soon as possible, given the volume of other requests. But the most interesting part of their response reads as follows: “The reported reference in the ODT (Mr McCabe, cited 28 January) to the external peer review was actually a reference to work the Council was undertaking to investigate the performance of the mudtank maintenance contractor…..”

So external means internal in the DCC, and widening means narrowing?

If the manager had been informed correctly, then there was no external review. Why, in that case, was I not told that nearly three months ago? Why did the Mayor apparently believe there was an external (independent, to use his wording) peer review? Furthermore, why did DCC fail to answer my three questions above.

I could, of course, ask these questions of DCC via LGOIMA, but I could then only expect an interim response followed by 20 more working days of inaction and worse.

Instead I have initiated a series of complaints to the Ombudsman, and decided that the public should view yet another example of how our City Hall is operating.

My intent throughout has been to identify the true causes of the June 2015 flood, so that real solutions can be identified and “political” solutions avoided. I have no intention of stopping, despite DCC’s apparent resistance.

[ends]

—

Neil Johnstone is welcome to publish emails supporting his story; it appears most if not all of the emails he received pertain under the Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act and therefore reside in public domain. However, the Ombudsmen are best to advise on these matters. In the meantime DCC is welcome to correct any factual errors, in the interests of accuracy and balance. -Eds.

—

Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

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

Delta EpicFail #8 : Cr Calvert goes AWOL, 23 Questions for Mr McKenzie —Saddlebags !!

Received from Christchurch Driver [CD]
Thu, 21 Jul 2016 at 1:11 a.m.

Readers, we must observe a minute’s silence for Councillor Calvert, who will be greatly missed. Councillor Calvert was one of few – very few – willing to shake off the soporific torpor afflicting so many of the elected representatives, ask penetrating questions, and not follow the herd. Some other Councillors think that simpering naivety is a fetching and winning look (and not just limited to one particular female councillor), but on the very few times your correspondent has been able to withstand viewing parts of a council meeting, he had a heaving feeling and it wasn’t stale milk in the Choysa.

Ms Calvert did make some missteps in her term, and the Court of Appeal judgement in relation to the James Queenstown Development undoubtedly might have affected her confidence to run, but this correspondent says, all is forgiven Hilary, the city needs you. A suggestion : Why not just go all out and stand for Mayor on the premise that you have done your time as Councillor and got treated like a mushroom by Mayor Cull et al, so you now know that to achieve reform in the city of Dunedin, you need to be at the top, and nothing else will do. That would be a powerful message and it would resonate with many. Please consider it. Readers, please post your support to show Cr Calvert there is a mayoral Calvert constituency – offers of assistance also appreciated !!

So the DCC has refused to answer Cr Calvert’s questions in relation to Delta. Instead, Mr McKenzie, “has been asked to contact” Cr Calvert. It is not recorded by the DCC if Mr McKenzie agreed to do this, or alternately, had been instructed to, ie couldn’t refuse to. Bureaucrats !!

But Mr McKenzie wants to hold a “workshop” with councillors on this issue. We can be so very very sure that without the efforts of What if? this workshop would never have seen the light of day. Your correspondent says this workshop is the first of the plaintive cries of ignorance and fast & furious duckshoving predicted in the EpicFail #6 post. What is not needed is some vague platitudes from the departing Mr McKenzie, who now has no stake or future in the DCC, but some evidence and history of the issue in writing, that can be considered by the people footing the bill, ie us. And there had better be something comprehensive and truthful – in writing, or the Ombudsman (who is already watching the DCC for its appalling LGOIMA performance on other matters) will be involved.

To this end, your ever helpful correspondent has prepared some additional questions for Mr McKenzie’s workshop in addition to Cr Calvert’s questions, that all ratepayers will be VERY interested to know the responses to. Councillors, feel free to pick and run with as many as you like. Goodness knows, even Mr Vaughan Elder of the ODT may want to pursue some : Breaking news is that the ODT is sick of being pummelled by What if? on this issue (and others) and has assigned Mr Elder to pursue the Delta / Noble story. Welcome to the party Mr Elder, good to have you aboard, unless you get captured by the DCHL / Delta party line that is, in which case you will receive no mercy from this correspondent.

Questions for Mr McKenzie (No, not you Graham, Grady and Delta directors…. but it’s coming….)

1. Do you agree that as DCC Group Chief Financial Officer (GCFO), you must answer all questions truthfully and disclose all material facts known in relation to issues you are reporting or advising on ?

2. When did you become aware of the partial assignment security sharing deeds with Gold Band Finance and Avanti Finance ?

3. Have you read the above documents ?

4. If you have read the documents, have you ever in your career seen a document with the same sort of provisions, and if not, did this create any alarm to you ?

5. If the document was not one you had ever experienced before, as the GCFO of the DCC, did you seek a further opinion on the legality or enforceability of the document ?

6. If you had read the document, why did you say that there is no relationship between Gold Band and Delta when this is demonstrably not true ?

7. If you had read the document, why did you say that the actions of Gold Band are “out of our control” when this is demonstrably not true ?

8. If you hadn’t read the document, how could you accurately say what sort of relationship there was between Gold Band and Delta ?

9. Did someone else advise you of this, and if so, who was it ?

10. Was pressure from the Mayor, Delta Management or Directors, or DCHL Directors brought to bear on you to say that there was no relationship between Delta and Gold Band ?

11. Do you consider the current court action, which is being paid for by Delta, a prudent use of ratepayer owned funds ?

12. How much has been spent on legal and staff costs on the current, ongoing court cases ?

13. If the document, ie partial security sharing deed that is the subject of the current court action is found by the Court to be illegal, do you think it is appropriate for the CEO and Directors who have allowed this happen and who were in place at the time the document was prepared, approved and signed, to remain in their positions ?

14. If the document is found to be illegal, what is your plan of action you will recommend to Delta/ DCHL/ DCC ?

15. If the document is found to be illegal, will you recommend to Delta/ DCHL/ DCC that legal action be taken against the law firm that prepared the agreement ?

16. Have you been advised in any way informally or formally, of any proposed Delta or DCC or DCHL involvement in the entity that is purchasing the land at the Noble Subdivision mortgagee sale ? And when were you made aware of it ?

17. If yes, precisely what information has been disclosed to Councillors ?

18. If nothing has been disclosed to councillors, why not ?

19. What amount of funding is proposed for this “involvement” and where will it come from ?

20. Is there any limit to further funds being committed to this proposal, if as often happens, budgets and timeframes are exceeded ?

21. As GCFO, do you think it is appropriate that Delta should have spent $3.39M on a questionable at best partial assignment when it’s five-year profit average is $2.6M ?

22. If you were the Delta CEO, would you have done this ?

23. Do you consider that the Management and Directors of Delta have acted ethically and within the law, and in a manner appropriate for a ratepayer owned company during your tenure at the DCC ?

?

█ For more, enter the terms *delta*, *noble* or *epic fraud* in the search box at right.

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Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

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

Cr Andrew Whiley easily points up Greenie Hawkins’ inadequacy #SouthDunedinFlood

LOUD Applause for Cr Andrew Whiley —whom Cr Hawkins thought he could sting with a little pop gun that blows bubbles. Greenie Hawkins is particularly keen was it(?) to stand in Waikouaiti Coast-Chalmers Ward at the next election, if that is his game in moving to Port Chalmers recently.

ODT 16.3.16 (page 14)

█ VIDEO Dunedin City Council – Council Meeting – November 30 2015
Published on Dec 7, 2015

### ODT Online Tue, 8 Mar 2016
South Dunedin needs some love from city
By Andrew Whiley [Councillor]
OPINION It is amazing how the future of South Dunedin has become such a political issue since the flood of June 3, 2015. […] It is a great community, with a vital shopping area, wonderful schools and proud citizens. It is a valuable area that just needs attention with the appropriate investment in services and maintenance. In my opinion, the flood of June 3 was exacerbated by the poor maintenance of the mud tanks and the issues around the Portobello Rd pumping station. The mud tank report has yet to come to the council but any resident in the area will tell you there was an issue with maintenance.
Read more

****

SOUTH DUNEDIN FLOOD | Stormwater Infrastructure Failure
After the DCC chief executive’s non-technical response to Neil Johnstone’s independent peer review of the DCC Water and Waste Services report 30 Nov 2015 [see too Neil Johnstone’s response to the chief executive’s letter]…. if I was Cr Andrew Whiley I wouldn’t put too much faith in DCC Transport’s forthcoming mudtank / stormwater drainage report —due for public release in April.

Remember that in advance of the two VERY LATE infrastructure performance reports was the DCC’s media statement that its lawyers and insurers had determined that the city council had no liability in connection with the [majorly devastating] flood event at South Dunedin on and about 3 June 2015.

█ 27.11.15 ODT: Council ‘not liable for flood damage’
“The Dunedin City Council says it is not liable for private property damage caused by the South Dunedin flood, despite admitting problems with its pumping network prolonged the pain for residents. […] The issue had been considered by the council’s lawyers and insurers, but the advice from both was the council was not liable, Mrs Stokes said.”

More:
12.10.15 ODT: Floods not expected to affect premiums
8.7.15 ODT: $2.75m flood bill for city
10.6.15 ODT: Mud-tanks did not worsen floods: DCC
9.6.15 ODT: Stream of complaints over mud-tank maintenance
8.6.15 ODT: Drains blocked, residents claim

****

MUDTANKS AND STORMWATER DRAINAGE

******Failed LGOIMA Request lodged by Elizabeth Kerr

From: Elizabeth Kerr
Sent: Monday, 25 January 2016 9:24 p.m.
To: Sandy Graham; DCC LGOIMA Information Request
Cc: Kristy Rusher; Elizabeth Kerr
Subject: LGOIMA Request – Ref No. 531420

Further to my use of the online form at DCC website:

Dear Sandy

LGOIMA Request – South Dunedin mudtanks and stormwater drains
Reference No. 531420

I request the following information:

1. Can Dunedin City Council tell me if all mudtanks and stormwater drains in the South Dunedin catchment have been physically cleared in the time elapsed since the 3 June 2015 flood?

2. How many times have these mudtanks and stormwater drains been checked and cleared since the 3 June 2015 flood?

3. Which contractor / subcontractor has been responsible for this monitoring and clearance work since the 3 June 2015 flood?

4. Who (name and staff position) at Dunedin City Council has been directly responsible for checking the contractor / subcontractor work since the 3 June 2015 flood?

5. Are there any items of stormwater infrastructure in the South Dunedin catchment that are known to be blocked or cannot be cleared (if for any reason), since the 3 June 2015 flood?

I look forward to your reply in digital format by email.

Kind regards, Elizabeth

—

Response

From: Kristy Rusher
Date: 26/01/2016 8:36 am (GMT+12:00)
To: Elizabeth Kerr, Sandy Graham, DCC LGOIMA Information Request
Subject: RE: LGOIMA Request – Ref No. 531420

Hi Elizabeth,

Thank you for your LGOIMA request. I have forwarded your questions to our Group Manager, Transport [Ian McCabe -Eds] for a response. As you are aware, a decision on your request will be made within 20 working days.

Regards,
Kristy Rusher

Kristy Rusher
Manager Civic and Legal, Civic
Dunedin City Council

—

Notice of Extension 1

From: Kristy Rusher
Sent: Tuesday, 23 February 2016 5:47 p.m.
To: Elizabeth Kerr
Subject: LGOIMA request – Mudtanks number: 531420

Hi Elizabeth,

The DCC is extending your request for information for 5 working days as meeting the time limits for the original request would unreasonably interfere with the operations of the Council (section 14(1)(a) of the Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act 1987).

Regards,

Kristy Rusher
Manager Civic and Legal, Civic
Dunedin City Council

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Notice of Extension 2

——– Original message ——–
From: Kristy Rusher
Date: 02/03/2016 8:29 am (GMT+12:00)
To: Elizabeth Kerr
Subject: Re: LGOIMA request – Mudtanks number: 531420

Hi Elizabeth,

The DCC is currently extending your information request for a further 15 working days (section 14(1)(a) LGOIMA 87). This is because meeting the timeframes would unreasonably interfere with organisational priorities.

Regards,
Kristy

Sent from my iPhone

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REQUEST DECLINED

From: Kristy Rusher
Sent: Monday, 14 March 2016 8:21 a.m.
To: Elizabeth Kerr
Subject: Information Request – Mudtanks.

Dear Elizabeth,

Your information request concerning mudtanks in the South Dunedin area has been declined, as this information will soon become publicly available in a report to Council in coming months (section 17(d) Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act 1987).

As we have declined your request, we are required to advise you that you may have this decision reviewed by the Ombudsman. The Ombudsman may be reached on the following contact details:

Email: info @ombudsman.parliament.nz

Free phone: [numbers deleted -Eds]

Regards,
Kristy Rusher
Manager Civic and Legal, Civic
Dunedin City Council

While the above correspondence was in play the following letter to the editor by John Evans (ODT 17.2.16) received reply from Mr Ian McCabe. Hmm.

And further, Ms Ruth Stokes declared (ODT 5.3.16) that CityCare had been awarded the contract to clear South Dunedin mudtanks:

New contractor for mud tanks
The companies responsible for keeping South Dunedin’s mud tanks clean, and stamping new markings on the city’s cycleways, are set to lose $15 million worth of contracts with the Dunedin City Council. The decisions were confirmed yesterday, as it was also announced City Care – a Christchurch City Council-owned company already working in Dunedin – would clean all 1500 mud tanks in South Dunedin over the next month.
Read more

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Related Posts and Comments:
● 8.3.16 Johnstone independent review of DCC report…
● 2.3.16 DCC compels extensions on LGOIMA requests #SouthDunedinFlood
26.2.16 Mudtanks and drains + Notice of Public Meeting #SouthDunedinFlood
● 21.2.16 DCC infrastructure report (30.11.15) subject to ‘internal review’ only…
● 13.2.16 South Dunedin Flood (3 June 2015): Bruce Hendry via ODT
4.2.16 2GP commissioner appears to tell Council outcome… #hazardzones
4.2.16 Level responses to Dunedin mayor’s hippo soup #Jun2015flood
30.1.16 DCC Rates: LOCAL CONTEXT not Stats —Delta and Hippopotamuses
25.1.16 DCC: South Dunedin Integrated Catchment Management Plan (ICMP)
19.1.16 Listener 23.1.16 (letter): South Dunedin #Jun2015flood
16.1.16 NZ Listener 16.1.16 (letter): South Dunedin #Jun2015flood
10.1.16 Infrastructure ‘open to facile misinterpretation’…. or local ignore
5.1.16 Hammered from all sides #fixit [dunedinflood Jun2015]
● 24.12.15 Site notice: posts removed
● 3.11.15 South Dunedin Flood | Correspondence & Debriefing Notes released by DCC today #LGOIMA

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

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Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

Delta #EpicFail —Noble Subdivision : [rephrased] Conflict of Interest

Election Year : The following opinion is offered in the public interest. -Eds

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Received from Christchurch Driver [CD]
Sun, 13 Mar 2016 at 6:00 p.m.

Dear Readers and What –if Mobsters

Your correspondent is given to understand there are several of you who enjoy his posts, which is certainly gratifying to him, if not to the DCC. However readers are taxing mistresses, they demand fresh and current material for their reading pleasure.

Discerning readers of taste and sophistication, of which you are without exception, are firmly of the view that there is nothing as old as yesterday’s news, and tonight’s post is indeed recycled and somewhat elderly. But wait, as Noble Investments Ltd said to the Judge Osbourne, I can explain why I have reneged on my obligations….

This week Mr Graham Crombie did more than re-release Delta CEO Grady Cameron’s press release. He advised What if? that he considered this post below “defamatory” to Mr McKenzie. And said that in effect he will soon have a letter from his lawyers about this. Although, What if? hasn’t actually seen the letter yet. We think it is in Mr Crombie’s other pocket, tangled up with some minties wrappers and the latest Harcourt’s update on the Noble Subdivision mortgagee sale process. Yes, that document has gone missing too.

This Correspondent was cut to the quick. Him ? Defamatory ? A Tom Kain Klone ? Forsooth, he faints at the sight of his own blood !

Friends, Romans, Dunedinites, I come not to bury Mr McKenzie but to praise him. (Eventually).

Here is the post, with all traces of defamation removed…. for Mr Crombie’s reading pleasure….

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Certain of you, have commented how in recent Council meetings DCC GCFO Grant McKenzie has several times now said he has a “conflict of interest”, when the question of the DCHL financial performance is raised by Councillors. He does not look comfortable in those situations.

OK, so what is this conflict of interest ? Mr McKenzie is the financial eyes and ears of the DCC. He is employed to preserve and maintain the financial stability of the DCC. This includes managing the hundreds of millions of debt that the DCC and its DCHL companies have; and having full oversight of the DCHL companies, which are in theory meant to be significant revenue generators for the DCC. (But, as Mr McKenzie admitted to Cr Lee Vandervis recently, DCHL companies will generate ZERO income (ie dividends) to the DCC for the next three years at least). However, despite the lack of dividends, they are still very significant DCC assets and it is completely right that Mr McKenzie should know in detail what is going on at DCHL.

This correspondent does not see how a conflict of interest can arise.

DCHL companies, owned by DCC, are for the sole purpose of generating a financial return to ease the rates burden. The historical amount of contributions provided by DCHL is shouted from the rooftops at every available opportunity by DCHL boosters. To this correspondent, there are only two ways in which Mr McKenzie could have “a conflict of interest” as he describes it. One is if the actions of the DCHL companies exceeded the risk profile that Mr McKenzie felt was appropriate for a DCC owned entity. The other is if the DCHL Companies were not in fact providing full or accurate information about their activities or intended activities to DCC or the elected representatives, and placing DCC at risk that way.

Readers, and Mr McKenzie, need to remember that Mr Larsen said in his report that the DCC needed to have a very low threshold for commercial risk, and much better communication. Mr McKenzie is there to make sure that DCHL doesn’t exceed a very low risk threshold and to tell us what he has found there. Tick the boxes for those items.

But who is paying Mr McKenzie ? The answer is the DCC. Therefore Mr McKenzie does not have a conflict of interest. He has a clear obligation to disclose to Council and ratepayers anything that is of concern at DCHL. He is not paid by council to shuffle from one foot to the other and claim a conflict of interest when asked questions of DCHL financial performance.

We should spare a thought for Mr McKenzie. He is the senior DCC staff member that has to represent the DCC’s interests. Those interests, first and foremost are to ensure that those DCC owned DCHL companies operate with a very low threshold for commercial risk. On the other hand, against him are legions of DCHL directors, who, if nothing else, appear extremely good at sugar coating bad news, or cloaking it in such a way as to make discerning the facts extremely difficult. (Mr Crombie, please read the Auditor-General’s report before you go reaching into your pocket). Add that to the subtle and not so subtle peer pressure, and it is easy to see Mr McKenzie has a tough job safeguarding the interests of ratepayers in respect of DCHL.

Refer to the video record (Part 1 and Part 2) for the full council meeting of 22 February 2016. This correspondent believes there is a (very) high possibility Mr McKenzie has not been told the full facts about Delta at Noble, or it has been spun to him with a few key, inconvenient facts omitted. If this is in fact correct and he acknowledged this, and then advised the city what he does know and provided an accurate assessment of the actual risk to ratepayer funds against the allowable “very low risk” threshold, he would have the support of DCC upper management and probably a job for life – if he wanted it.

Mr McKenzie would not have to look too far to find inspiration or a precedent in Dunedin. Just a couple of blocks away at the Hospital in fact. In 2008 the recently appointed Health Board Chief Financial Officer, Robert Mackway-Jones, discovered some unusual transactions that was of course the $16.9M Michael Swann fraud. Mr Mackway-Jones didn’t let up, pushed the issue and found that neither the Board Chair, Mr Richard Thomson, nor the Board CEO, knew of the transactions. Mr Mackway-Jones was the hero of the Swann case; and Mr McKenzie only has to present the facts to Dunedin ratepayers to achieve the same status.

This correspondent understands Mr McKenzie is already well regarded within DCC upper ranks. But if he did this he would be so popular with Dunedin ratepayers he could run for Mayor next time around….

Dunedin ratepayers just need Mr McKenzie to represent their interest, and forsake the tea and cakes, and mutual backslapping with DCHL Directors.

This will mean clashes with the DCHL directors at times……..

Tis food for thought, mobsters (as the Clash would say…. Revolution Rock, London Calling, 1979).

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Related Posts and Comments:
● 11.3.16 Delta peripheral #EpicFail : Stonewood Homes & ancient Delta history
● 6.3.16 Delta #EpicFail —Noble Subdivision : Tea & Taxing Questions
● 6.3.16 Delta #EpicFail —Nobel Subdivision : A Neighbour responds
● 5.3.16 Delta #EpicFail —Noble Subdivision —Epic Fraud
● 4.3.16 Delta —Noble Subdivision #EpicStorm Heading OUR WAY
● 4.3.16 Delta #EpicFail Noble Subdivision : Councillors know NOTHING
● 2.3.16 Delta #EpicFail Noble Subdivision : A Dog, or a RAVING YAPPER?….
● 1.3.16 Delta #EpicFail… —The Little Finance Company that did (Delta).
29.2.16 Healthy views Monday midnight to 6:00 p.m.
● 29.2.16 Delta #EpicFail Noble Subdivision : NBR interested in bidders
● 28.2.16 Delta #EpicFail Noble… If I were a rich man / Delta Director
● 27.2.16 Delta #EpicFail Noble Subdivision Consent : Strictly Optional
● 27.2.16 Delta #NUCLEAR EpicFail —Noble Subdivision : Incompetent…
● 25.2.16 Delta #EpicFail: Mayor Cull —Forced Sale Fundamentals 101
● 24.2.16 Delta #EpicFail —Noble Subdivision: Cameron, Crombie & McKenzie
● 23.2.16 DCC: DCHL half year result to 31 December 2015
19.2.16 Delta: Update on Yaldhurst subdivision debt recovery
15.2.16 Delta / DCHL not broadcasting position on subdivision mortgagee tender
30.1.16 DCC Rates: LOCAL CONTEXT not Stats —Delta and Hippopotamuses
● 29.1.16 Delta #EpicFail —Yaldhurst Subdivision ● Some forensics
● 21.1.16 Delta #EpicFail —Yaldhurst Subdivision
21.1.16 DCC LTAP 2016/17 budget discussion #ultrahelpfulhints
10.1.16 Infrastructure ‘open to facile misinterpretation’…. or local ignore
15.12.15 Noble property subdivision aka Yaldhurst Village | Mortgagee Tender
21.9.15 DCC: Not shite (?) hitting the fan but DVL
20.7.15 Noble property subdivision —DELTA #LGOIMA
1.4.15 Christchurch subdivisions: Heat gone?
24.3.15 Noble property subdivision —DELTA
23.3.15 Noble property subdivision: “Denials suggest that we have not learned.”
17.3.15 DCC —Delta, Jacks Point Luggate II…. Noble property subdivision

● Gold Band Finance Prospectus No. 31 Dated 22 April 2015
View this 126pp document via the NZ Companies website at: https://www.business.govt.nz/companies/app/ui/pages/companies/321896/documents — go to Prospectus uploaded 23 Apr 2015 14:33

● 14.5.14 (via DCC website) Larsen Report February 2012
A recent governance review of the Dunedin City Council companies was conducted by Warren Larsen.

● 20.3.14 Delta: Report from Office of the Auditor-General
Inquiry into property investments by Delta Utility Services Limited at Luggate and Jacks Point

█ For more, enter the term *delta* in the search box at right.

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Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

*Image: the-rudy.com – The Clash Revolution Rock w2 tee

Delta peripheral #EpicFail : Stonewood Homes and ancient Delta history

Received from Chrsitchurch Driver [CD]
Fri, 11 Mar 2016 at 1:35 a.m.

Your correspondent is going to meander down some tangential subdivision side streets tonight (not the main collector road, the excavator won’t fit on those….) and consider the curious case of Stonewood Homes.

It was probably inevitable given the very shallow gene pool that South Island companies fish in for independent directors, that a name would pop up that had also had some previous form with Delta.

However, before we excavate that particular trench, let’s consider why the shoring gave way on Stonewood, why the temporary support from the bank buckled and the subsequent structural failure – (the engineering metaphors are flying thick and fast tonight….)

Your correspondent is very bemused at the vast sums that a large number of building and engineering companies seem to be able to generate – in the negative. An internet search shows a long and regular list of failures. (Delta Civil Division would doubtless have joined them had it not had ratepayer funds to prop it up). Hartner Construction in 2001, about $20M, Wellington Construction in 2012 (unknown), Mainzeal Construction in 2013 (between $60-130M, dependent on if related party transactions can be unwound) and, closer to home, Southland’s own Amalgamated Builders (also with a branch in Dunedin) who managed to lose $20M in just two years when they bought a reputable Auckland company, Goodall Construction, renamed it Goodall ABL and then proceeded to destroy it in 2001.

There is some illuminating information online that shows the insane amount of risk that companies in the construction sector assume for what appears to be very little reward.

In the ABL Goodall case, property commentator Bob Dey described Goodall ABL as “a victim of trying to win market share on no margin, with a maximum guaranteed price contract in place”. Quite why anyone would seek to perform somewhere between $60-80M of work in two years for no return sounds like Delta-level stupidity, and certainly, the result was the same : ABL Goodall went so comprehensively broke, mainly with subcontractors’ money, that it was a major catalyst for the Government of the day to introduce the Construction Contracts Act in 2002 which provided some protection for Subcontractors. Proof that Southlanders do have some uses other than milking cows (readers, I jest).

Delta may yet provide compelling evidence for the Government to remove the “power of general competence” that Territorial Authorities received from the Government in 2002 that started many down the path towards illusory piles of gold that vanished in a mirage, along with a lot of public funds.

Memo To Mr Crombie : The CCC have admitted defeat and are trying to sell their Delta equivalent, City Care : why not join up and make it a two-for-one deal ?

But back to Stonewood. A trio of heavy hitters arrived in February 2014 to help fix the Stonewood Homes brand. In the press release it was noted that in 2013, Stonewood had consented 407 homes, had a turnover of $133M, and was aiming for 500 consents in 2014.

Your correspondent now will do something unheard of – making excuses for Delta…. as follows :

Building houses is not the same as civil contracting or commercial building. Those sectors all indulge in unique one off projects, with different specifications, different designers and engineers who have different standards. Lots of risk with ground conditions, legal disputes are legion.

But “group” housing is just different variations on the same cookie cutter. Standard designs, tweaked a little here and there, flat sites, lots of repetition, production line type processes. Houses started and finished around 14-16 weeks. Deposits before you start, a sales force to keep the numbers flowing. Any amount of back costing and analysis off repetitive designs to check what the numbers should be. It’s all been done before, lots of other companies are doing it so “benchmarking” your company against your competitors is easy.

Stonewood weren’t building difficult or expensive homes : Their average house cost around $325,000 in 2013. (Turnover of $133M for 407 homes).

Receivers KordaMentha confirmed that Stonewood had built up “significant” debt since the earthquake. Let us assume that Stonewood’s losses began in 2012 continuing in 2013, 2014, 2015. The loss is currently $30M. Your correspondent understands that the ASB is owed $5M and that typically, of the 110 houses underway at any one time, only 30 were profitable, and this was known within the company.

That Stonewood were unable to make any money at all, but instead went deeper into debt over a four-year period of huge demand is certainly testament to some Delta-level management deficiencies. One, or one and a half years of losses is grave but understandable, two to three is indefensible, and four years just plain carelessness !

Assuming an average turnover of about $115-120M per year (ie a peak turnover of $133M in 2013), this means that each year they lost $7.5M on average. (It was probably less in 2012, a lot more in 2015).

Put another way, on every house they built, over a four-year period, they lost around $21,000. Yes, they can definitely have a seat at the Delta table. And one Stonewood Director has sat at that table before, and that is Mr Jim Boult.

Now Mr Boult, while no Tom Kain in terms of litigation, certainly knows his way to his lawyer’s office, so this correspondent shall confine his comments to the facts :

Mr Boult, you may recall, had a 50/50 Joint Venture (JV) with Delta on the failed Luggate Development, where Delta lost $5.9M. Delta’s terms there were similar to Noble : A $5M advance to cover the subdivision work, payable only when the sections were sold.

Mr Boult utilised a valuer on behalf of the JV who had previously valued the land for his company. The valuer, in calculating the value of the land assumed a figure of $55,000 per section for Development costs. The actual cost was $105,000 per section. The valuer assessed the value of the land Delta bought a 50% share in, at $10.7M. There were potentially 172 sections that could be developed on the land. Six of the 172 sections were sold. The remaining land, with (a relatively small amount of) Delta’s improvements, was eventually sold…. for $1.5M. This information is all contained in the Auditor-General’s Report (14 March 2014).

A small but noteworthy detail included in the Auditor-General’s report was that the terms of the Joint Venture meant that Delta staff were not paid for any time they spent on the JV or the project, unless it was directly related to the Civil Work. A Project Management firm, Signal, was employed to manage the project. However Mr Boult sought and received $5,000 per month “for his time” spent on the Luggate JV.

Back to Stonewood, it turns out that Mr Boult was unable to make any difference to turn around Stonewood’s fortunes in 2015. Mr Boult’s enthusiasm for Stonewood : “I am truly delighted to be the chair and help guide the company in its future direction” lasted just 12 months. Nonetheless he obviously saw something he liked at Stonewood as he confirmed last week that he had quit as a Director of Stonewood on 1 February 2016, because, in concert with some employees of Stonewood and some franchisees, he was trying to buy Stonewood. This seems unusual behaviour for the chair of a large company, but then your correspondent is not a member of the Institute of Directors, and is uncertain of the usual directorial protocols about directors or chairmen of the board trying to buy a company they just resigned from last week. Perhaps a reader experienced in such matters could provide enlightenment.

Yes readers, I can sense your impatience : Join the dots you say ! This correspondent’s opinion, and it is only an opinion from the outside looking in, is that Mr Boult, was looking to buy not only Stonewood, but is most likely involved with a mortgagee sale bid to purchase the Noble Subdivision at Yaldhurst. The intention being that Stonewood would be the builder of the subdivision, both effectively controlled by Mr Boult.

Mr Boult knows the subdivision business, and he now has an inside view of how housing companies are run (or more accurately, how not to run one).

Despite Mr Boult’s defeat at the hands of the Brothers Chow in respect of Stonewood, a bid for Noble may well be attractive to him.

Now given Mr Boult’s history with Delta, it would seem highly likely that if this were the case, there would have been some contact between Mr Boult and his people and Delta.

Can Delta or its Directors or Mr Crombie confirm ? And of course as is the refrain, that no more public funds will be put at risk ?

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New Zealand Companies register: Delta Utility Services Limited (453486)

█ Directors: David John Frow (appointed 25 Oct 2012), Trevor John Kempton (01 Nov 2013), Stuart James McLauchlan (01 Jun 2007), Ian Murray Parton (25 Oct 2012)

More: Historic data for directors

Related Posts and Comments:
● 10.3.16 Noble Subdivision next on the shopping list !!! You couldn’t…
● 6.3.16 Delta #EpicFail —Noble Subdivision : Tea & Taxing Questions
● 6.3.16 Delta #EpicFail —Nobel Subdivision : A Neighbour responds
● 5.3.16 Delta #EpicFail —Noble Subdivision —Epic Fraud
● 4.3.16 Delta —Noble Subdivision #EpicStorm Heading OUR WAY
● 4.3.16 Delta #EpicFail Noble Subdivision : Councillors know NOTHING
● 2.3.16 Delta #EpicFail Noble Subdivision : A Dog, or a RAVING YAPPER?….
● 1.3.16 Delta #EpicFail… —The Little Finance Company that did (Delta).
● 29.2.16 Delta #EpicFail Noble Subdivision : NBR interested in bidders
● 28.2.16 Delta #EpicFail Noble… If I were a rich man / Delta Director
● 27.2.16 Delta #EpicFail Noble Subdivision Consent : Strictly Optional
● 27.2.16 Delta #NUCLEAR EpicFail —Noble Subdivision : Incompetent…
● 25.2.16 Delta #EpicFail: Mayor Cull —Forced Sale Fundamentals 101
● 24.2.16 Delta #EpicFail —Noble Subdivision : Cameron, Crombie & McKenzie
● 23.2.16 DCC: DCHL half year result to 31 December 2015
19.2.16 Delta: Update on Yaldhurst subdivision debt recovery
15.2.16 Delta / DCHL not broadcasting position on subdivision mortgagee tender
30.1.16 DCC Rates: LOCAL CONTEXT not Stats —Delta and Hippopotamuses
● 29.1.16 Delta #EpicFail —Yaldhurst Subdivision ● Some forensics
● 21.1.16 Delta #EpicFail —Yaldhurst Subdivision
21.1.16 DCC LTAP 2016/17 budget discussion #ultrahelpfulhints
10.1.16 Infrastructure ‘open to facile misinterpretation’…. or local ignore
15.12.15 Noble property subdivision aka Yaldhurst Village | Mortgagee Tender
21.9.15 DCC: Not shite (?) hitting the fan but DVL
20.7.15 Noble property subdivision —DELTA #LGOIMA
1.4.15 Christchurch subdivisions: Heat gone?
24.3.15 Noble property subdivision —DELTA
23.3.15 Noble property subdivision: “Denials suggest that we have not learned.”
17.3.15 DCC —Delta, Jacks Point Luggate II…. Noble property subdivision

● Gold Band Finance Prospectus No. 31 Dated 22 April 2015
View this 126pp document via the NZ Companies website at: https://www.business.govt.nz/companies/app/ui/pages/companies/321896/documents — go to Prospectus uploaded 23 Apr 2015 14:33

● 14.5.14 (via DCC website) Larsen Report February 2012
A recent governance review of the Dunedin City Council companies was conducted by Warren Larsen.

● 20.3.14 Delta: Report from Office of the Auditor-General
Inquiry into property investments by Delta Utility Services Limited at Luggate and Jacks Point

█ For more, enter the term *delta* in the search box at right.

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Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

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

*Images: (top) stonewood.co.nz – Chow Bros | stuff.co.nz – Jim Boult by Stacy Squires

Johnstone independent review of DCC report #SouthDunedinFlood

Semi-retired consulting engineer Neil Johnstone was invited to speak to his independent review of the DCC report, Infrastructure Performance During June 2015 Flood Event (30 Nov 2015), at Monday night’s public meeting held in South Dunedin.

Large numbers of local householders and business people, together with news media, filled Nations Church Auditorium at 334 King Edward Street, to examine why South Dunedin “flooded” on 3 June of last year.

Dunedin City Council personnel who didn’t bother to show up included Mayor Cull, CE Bidrose and members of the Executive Leadership Team (RLT). How many elected council representatives turned up —one, Cr Mike Lord (the question was nearly rhetorical although a couple of councillors had forwarded their apologies).

A fortnight ago Mr Johnstone sent a copy of his review to DCC chief executive Sue Bidrose. Notably, it took until the day of the public meeting for Ms Bidrose to acknowledge receipt and respond to the review by letter —DCC made sure to effect personal delivery to Mr Johnson’s home in Macandrew Bay, followed by an electronic copy some time later.

Copies of the review were circulated at the public meeting —these were in some demand!

Following the close of meeting, the reviewer kindly supplied What if? Dunedin with copy for publication.

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WEBSITE DISCLAIMER
The following content from consulting engineer Neil Johnstone is provided for your information and convenience. However, the site owner cannot accept any liability for its accuracy or content. Visitors who rely on this information do so at their own risk.

An Independent Review if DCC Report
‘Infrastructure Performance during the June 2015 Flood Event’

1. Having lived most of my life in Dunedin and its environs (though never in South Dunedin), and having had a long career in natural hazard identification and mitigation, I am concerned with the standard of understanding and reporting of current natural hazard issues by our local Councils and, to a lesser extent by Government Agencies. I spent many years as Investigations Engineer at the Otago Catchment Board from 1986, and held a similar position at the Otago Regional Council until 2002. During those years I analysed numerous recent and historic flood events; none was more straightforward than the South Dunedin flood event of June 2015, and many were far more complicated. Now semi-retired, I still operate my own small consultancy.

2. In my opinion the DCC Report might best have been produced by independent experts, or – at the very least – have been subject to rigorous expert peer review. Current “victims” of the in-house reporting approach appear to include residents of South Dunedin who were affected by the June 2015 flood, and the wider population of the city and beyond who have been presented with information of questionable validity.

3. I have no personal interest in the South Dunedin area, but do jointly own a property elsewhere in Dunedin City. This paper only peer reviews DCC’s Report Infrastructure Performance During the June 2015 [Flood] Event. Further reviews of other hazard reports are planned. The reader can access online both DCC’s Report on the June 2015 flood event (referred herein to as “the DCC Report”) and ORC’s report Coastal Otago Flood Event, 3 June 2015 (referred herein to as “the ORC Report”). The latter is frequently referenced in the DCC Report.

4. The DCC Report is lacking in detail and thoroughness. It is short, but neither concise nor accurate, in my view. No reason is given why such a simplistic document took virtually six months to produce. By contrast, an earlier DCC report on the South Dunedin flood of 9 March 1968 took about a week to prepare following that event. My review is intended to provide alternative and more plausible explanations for the flooding experienced in June to those given in the DCC Report and accepted and promoted by some Councillors. I have used almost exclusively data provided by ORC and DCC publications. My approach is reasonably “broad-brushed”, but to a level of accuracy I believe limited only by the quality of data available.

5. Specifically, the DCC Report lacks objectivity in that it:

A. exaggerates the historical significance of the June 2015 rainfall,

B. repeatedly (and contrary to very clear evidence) identifies high groundwater levels as a prime cause of the flooding,

C. fails to discuss why staff did not (apparently) continuously attempt clearance of pumping station screens,

D. fails to adequately address the impacts on total runoff volume of reduced ground surface permeability due to land use change,

E. promotes a simplistic flow volume model that contains a key erroneous assumption,

F. fails to quantify ingress of “foreign” water from other sub-catchments, especially St Clair,

G. refers only briefly to the Shore St (Tainui) sub-catchment, and then fails to note that flooding was much less significant there than in the South Dunedin catchment or to explain the reason why,

H. defends the maintenance performance of mudtanks without providing any supporting evidence.

6. With respect to the above lettered points:

Point A: DCC has persistently exaggerated the significance of recent rainfall in the city. Initial claims regarding the June rainfall had it as a 150-year event, and (with respect to a disadvantaged peninsula property owner) reportedly claimed rainfall intensities increasing by 82% as a result of climate change. Now the June [flood] is stated in the Report to be a 63 year event. Such claims are all substantially in error. Rainfall in the March 1968 event is conceded in the DCC Report to be higher than in June 2015, yet the earlier event is omitted from consideration of flood frequency. Inclusion of the 1968 rainfall must substantially reduce the assessed return period of the 2015 rainfall.

Delta #EpicFail —Noble Subdivision : Tea & Taxing Questions

Received from Christchurch Driver [CD]
Sun, 6 Mar 2016 at 10:23 p.m.

Mr Crombie has spoken. A press release on Thursday : Something old, something new, something borrowed, with no clue.

Your correspondent has a theory in relation to Mr Crombie’s press release. Your correspondent surmises that a copy of Delta CEO Grady Cameron’s press release appears to have stuck to Mr Crombie’s saucer (stress – jiggling – spillage !!) when he was having tea and cakes in Mr Cameron’s office last week, and Mr Crombie absent mindedly put it in his pocket. Mr Crombie being a busy man then noticed it a few days later amidst some empty Cadbury Favourites wrappers and Kit-Kat bars. Thinking that he was meant to have done something, and with Grady’s cell phone off, he panics, and emails off the release, which of course is a re-run of Mr Cameron’s effort.

Mr Crombie did say there had been “some misinformation” about the mortgagee sale process. There certainly has, and it is all from Delta and its directors.

Your correspondent and Delta are of one mind here : There is no need for any confusion, Dunedinites will have a lot less suspicion and worry if we had accurate information that Delta and its Directors were not the white collar robbers of the DCC public purse that your correspondent has made them out to be.

To this end, some public minded citizens might want to put in a LGOIMA request, or perhaps write to the ODT with the following questions for Delta, to assist with the excellent What if? efforts on Noble to date.

Let us relax with a cup of Bell’s best and have our fears assuaged. Or perhaps, let us watch the twists and turns of outrageous logic that Mr Cameron will use to explain away these very simple questions :

How much of the $3.3M Delta paid to “strengthen its position” has been paid to Gold Band and Avanti Finance. This is an easy one for starters – readers of course know the answer ($2.7M) because Gold Band have told us, but if Delta get this wrong, we then know it has a telling-the-truth problem as well as previously canvassed numbers, counting and comprehension problems.

What was the remaining funds of the $3.3M spent on ?

Or in case this isn’t clear enough :

How much of the $3.3M has been paid for any advice, fees, or any other sort of payment in relation to the Noble Yaldhurst Subdivision, that was not for the actual direct purchase of first mortgage securities ?

In regard to the question above, who was this money paid to ?

How much Head Office staff time has been spent on the Noble Subdivision since December 2009 and has it been charged to the project ?

Did Delta, or any party associated with Delta, instruct, or convey to Gold Band Finance in any way, that Delta would not allow Gold Band to sell its first mortgage security to other parties (ie, other than Delta) with an interest in the land ?

Can Delta confirm that it will not offer vendor finance, and will not enter into a profit / revenue sharing agreement to the eventual purchaser of the land from the mortgagee sale process ?

Can Delta confirm that in addition to the above, it will not offer any kind of assistance to the eventual purchaser of the land ?

How much has Delta or DCHL paid Mr M Frost for any services related to the Noble Subdivision since 2012 ?

Can Delta confirm that no past or present Delta Directors, and also Mr J Boult, and Mr M Frost, are not involved, or offered any kind of advice or assistance to any of the mortgagee sale bidders ?

Is it true that due to recent developments, and subsequent to the date that tenders closed for the mortgagee sale, the firm conducting the mortgagee sale process, and/or other parties, has been urging other parties, who did not make a bid, to make a bid, even though tenders have closed ?

Given that we are dealing with Delta, perhaps readers should just consider three at most per request so as not to overtax Delta capacities.

These are all critical questions. Memo to Grady and Graham : Better to answer them now, the next time these questions are asked you will be best advised to have a lawyer – your own personal lawyer that you pay for, not a Delta one – present. (Suggestion : NOT the ones that wrote the security sharing deed….). Memo to Graham : $900 a day will not go far on lawyers’ costs.

And Graham : Note to Self : Conduct cost / benefit and personal risk register of Delta involvement. (Memo to Grady : At a salary of $2,090 per working day, hire whatever lawyer you want).

Alert readers will have noticed some of these questions suggest there are yet more horror stories and shady dealings your correspondent wishes to bring to the surface. Indeed there are, but let us have Delta’s position first, to avoid speculation. Of course we will have no option to speculate if nothing is forthcoming, and speculate we will.

For your correspondent, Delta at the Noble Subdivision is the gift that keeps on giving.

█ For more, enter the term *delta* in the search box at right.

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Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

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

Delta #EpicFail —Nobel Subdivision : A Neighbour responds

Comment received in reply to CD’s latest post (5.3.16):

Chutchings hut
March 5, 2016 at 9:06 am

The neighbours have a history of objecting, they are not the innocents you portray. The allegations about inadequate infrastructure are nonsense.

—

A Neighbour responds
Sun, 6 Mar 2016 at 3:26 p.m.

“Chutchings hut”, your post here resembles that of C(hris) Hutching’s from NBR. Maybe you’re both?? Either way your posting here and his on NBR, respectfully, is unsubstantiated and misinformed as many have been by NIL during this sad saga. Allow me to enlighten you.

The CCC stormwater experts, an external peer review, and even NIL’s own stormwater designer Cardno have confirmed the stormwater infrastructure IS “inadequate”. Existing roads need to be dug and pipes upsized. I can send you whatever evidence you want?

Further, the road infrastructure is not only “inadequate”, it was found by the Independent Safety Audit [Dr Turner and other traffic experts] to be have “numerous serious safety issues that cause frequent serious injuries and deaths”.

This is why the Elected Council voted to quash the retrospective decision CCC staff procured non-notified to consent the unsafe roads they had already permitted to be constructed without consent.

You are right though that resident stakeholders in the subdivision (neighbours as you refer to them) have a history of objecting, that’s because they have had much to object about. Your post here that they are “not innocents”, and Chris Hutching’s information in NBR that the objections were “belated objections” … “after consents were obtained and the streetworks constructed” is not correct. Public information proves otherwise:-

• Affected residents that will have to use these roads objected from mid 2010 when the roads were being constructed without consent to grossly non-complying standards.

• NIL and CCC staff had agreed to these gross non-compliances behind-closed-doors.

• CCC staff oppressed the affected residents and denied them (and the public) their legal rights under the RMA to oppose the gross non-compliances and dangers.

• The illegally built roads were retrospectively consented 12 months after the objections, in July 2011. (This was 19 months after the variation application was made in December 2009 to make the main spine road 7.5m narrower than required. Doubling of traffic on the narrow roads due to non-notified increases in residential density and the commercial area came later).

• The Elected Council voted for the Independent Safety Audit (against CCC staff’s strong advice). It found the non-complying roads had “numerous serious safety issues that cause frequent serious injuries and deaths”. This caused the Elected Council to quash the wrong, unsafe and “unreasonable” (“RMA term”) decision that CCC staff’s oppression of affected parties and CCC staff’s false tailoring of expert reports ensured.

• Yours and Chris Hutching’s NBR misinformation on this is respectfully forgiven; many have been misinformed of facts in this sorry saga.

Delta —Noble Subdivision #EpicStorm Heading OUR WAY

Election Year : The following item is offered in the public interest. -Eds

IMPENDING POST ALERT
CD has THE story for you……….. soon

█ For more, enter *delta* in the search box at right.

—

Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

*Image: thinkdelta.co.nz – delta-waste-digger tweaked by whatifdunedin

Delta #EpicFail Noble Subdivision : Councillors know NOTHING

ODT 3.3.16 (page 14)

—

THIS IS SURPRISING, DO WE BELIEVE HIM

“Delta has provided regular updates to its shareholder, Dunedin City Holdings Ltd, which has in turn informed Dunedin city councillors in briefings throughout the project.” –Grady Cameron, Delta Chief Executive

IPAD BLANK, NO MESSAGES, BLUE TAPE

Delta-communications-ipad

Urban Dictionary
Blue Tape: A term used to express the ratio of service offered in an Emergency …. versus the quantity of seemingly available staff. Often considered to be greater in truth when expressed as the inverse of the service to staff ratio.

DUNEDIN CITY COUNCILLORS FEAR MULTIMILLION-DOLLAR LOSSES FROM DELTA BUT THEN WHAT IF? HEARD IT WAS DELTA DRIVING THE MORTGAGEE SALE AT YALDHURST

[timemanagementninja.com]
Blue tape is the start of something new.
A construction project. Building something new. Remodeling something existing. Producing something better than was there previously.
Blue tape represents constructive, productive activity.
So, which does your company deal in? Red or blue tape?

GRADY ????!!!!!!!

—

Related Posts and Comments:
● 2.3.16 Delta #EpicFail Noble Subdivision : A Dog, or a RAVING YAPPER?….
● 1.3.16 Delta #EpicFail… —The Little Finance Company that did (Delta).
● 29.2.16 Delta #EpicFail Noble Subdivision : NBR interested in bidders
● 28.2.16 Delta #EpicFail Noble… If I were a rich man / Delta Director
● 27.2.16 Delta #EpicFail Noble Subdivision Consent : Strictly Optional
● 27.2.16 Delta #NUCLEAR EpicFail —Noble Subdivision : Incompetent…
● 25.2.16 Delta #EpicFail: Mayor Cull —Forced Sale Fundamentals 101
● 24.2.16 Delta #EpicFail —Noble Subdivision: Cameron, Crombie & McKenzie
● 23.2.16 DCC: DCHL half year result to 31 December 2015
19.2.16 Delta: Update on Yaldhurst subdivision debt recovery
15.2.16 Delta / DCHL not broadcasting position on subdivision mortgagee tender
30.1.16 DCC Rates: LOCAL CONTEXT not Stats —Delta and Hippopotamuses
● 29.1.16 Delta #EpicFail —Yaldhurst Subdivision ● Some forensics
● 21.1.16 Delta #EpicFail —Yaldhurst Subdivision
21.1.16 DCC LTAP 2016/17 budget discussion #ultrahelpfulhints
10.1.16 Infrastructure ‘open to facile misinterpretation’…. or local ignore
15.12.15 Noble property subdivision aka Yaldhurst Village | Mortgagee Tender
21.9.15 DCC: Not shite (?) hitting the fan but DVL
20.7.15 Noble property subdivision —DELTA #LGOIMA
1.4.15 Christchurch subdivisions: Heat gone?
24.3.15 Noble property subdivision —DELTA
23.3.15 Noble property subdivision: “Denials suggest that we have not learned.”
17.3.15 DCC —Delta, Jacks Point Luggate II…. Noble property subdivision

● 14.5.14 (via DCC website) Larsen Report February 2012
A recent governance review of the Dunedin City Council companies was conducted by Warren Larsen.

● 20.3.14 Delta: Report from Office of the Auditor-General
Inquiry into property investments by Delta Utility Services Limited at Luggate and Jacks Point

█ For more, enter the term *delta* in the search box at right.

—

Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

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

—

DCC compels extensions on LGOIMA requests #SouthDunedinFlood

Received.
Not shooting the messenger.

From: Elizabeth Kerr
Sent: Wednesday, 2 March 2016 9:50 a.m.
To: Kristy Rusher
Cc: Elizabeth Kerr; Sue Bidrose; Sandy Graham; Editor @odt.co.nz
Subject: Re: LGOIMA request – Mudtanks number: 531420

Dear Kristy

The extensions are clearly becoming an unnecessary problem.

I will be in touch again on this matter within 48 hours.

Regards

Elizabeth Kerr

Sent from my smartphone network

——– Original message ——–
From: Kristy Rusher
Date: 02/03/2016 8:29 am (GMT+12:00)
To: Elizabeth Kerr
Subject: Re: LGOIMA request – Mudtanks number: 531420

Hi Elizabeth,

The DCC is currently extending your information request for a further 15 working days (section 14(1)(a) LGOIMA 87). This is because meeting the timeframes would unreasonably interfere with organisational priorities.

Regards,
Kristy

Sent from my iPhone

On 23/02/2016, at 5:46 PM, “Kristy Rusher” wrote:

Hi Elizabeth,

The DCC is extending your request for information for 5 working days as meeting the time limits for the original request would unreasonably interfere with the operations of the Council (section 14(1)(a) of the Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act 1987).

Regards,

Kristy Rusher
Manager Civic and Legal, Civic
Dunedin City Council

[my emphasis in Kristy’s email messages]
—

DCC forwarded the following request to new group manager transport Ian McCabe, for reply:

January 25, 2016 at 9:36 pm

From: Elizabeth Kerr
Sent: Monday, 25 January 2016 9:24 p.m.
To: Sandy Graham; DCC LGOIMA Information Request
Cc: Kristy Rusher; Elizabeth Kerr
Subject: LGOIMA Request – Ref No. 531420

Further to my use of the online form at DCC website:

Dear Sandy

LGOIMA Request – South Dunedin mudtanks and stormwater drains
Reference No. 531420

I request the following information:

1. Can Dunedin City Council tell me if all mudtanks and stormwater drains in the South Dunedin catchment have been physically cleared in the time elapsed since the 3 June 2015 flood?

2. How many times have these mudtanks and stormwater drains been checked and cleared since the 3 June 2015 flood?

3. Which contractor / subcontractor has been responsible for this monitoring and clearance work since the 3 June 2015 flood?

4. Who (name and staff position) at Dunedin City Council has been directly responsible for checking the contractor / subcontractor work since the 3 June 2015 flood?

5. Are there any items of stormwater infrastructure in the South Dunedin catchment that are known to be blocked or cannot be cleared (if for any reason), since the 3 June 2015 flood?

I look forward to your reply in digital format by email.

Kind regards, Elizabeth

—

New guides to the OIA and LGOIMA for agencies and requesters
were issued by new Chief Ombudsman Judge Peter Boshier on 17 Dec 2015.

EXTENSIONS
An agency may extend the maximum time limit for transferring a request or making a decision and communicating it to you, if:
• your request is for, or requires a search through, a large quantity of information and meeting the original time limit would unreasonably interfere with the agency’s operations; or
• consultations needed to make a decision on your request mean than a proper response cannot be made within the original time limit.
The extension must be for a reasonable period of time in the circumstances.
The agency must notify you of the extension within 20 working days after the day it received your request. The notice must:
• specify the period of the extension;
• give the reasons for the extension; and
● state that you have the right to complain to an Ombudsman about the extension.
While more than one extension may be made within the original 20 working days (if necessary), no further extensions may be made once the original 20 working day maximum time limit has passed.

Source: Making official information requests: A guide for requesters
Download PDF 829 KB | Download DOC 654 KB

—

█ PUBLIC MEETING – SOUTH DUNEDIN FLOOD
South Dunedin MP Clare Curran is convening a public meeting on Monday 7 March at 6:00 p.m. in the Nations Church Auditorium, 334 King Edward Street, to look at why South Dunedin “flooded” on 3 June last year. All Welcome.

Otago Daily Times Published on Jun 4, 2015
Raw aerial video of Dunedin Flooding
Video courtesy One News

—

Related Posts and Comments:
26.2.16 Mudtanks and drains + Notice of Public Meeting #SouthDunedinFlood
21.2.16 DCC infrastructure … report (30.11.15) subject to ‘internal review’ only
13.2.16 South Dunedin Flood (3 June 2015): Bruce Hendry via ODT
4.2.16 2GP commissioner appears to tell Council outcome… #hazardzones
4.2.16 Level responses to Dunedin mayor’s hippo soup #Jun2015flood
30.1.16 DCC Rates: LOCAL CONTEXT not Stats —Delta and Hippopotamuses
25.1.16 DCC: South Dunedin Integrated Catchment Management Plan (ICMP)
19.1.16 Listener 23.1.16 (letter): South Dunedin #Jun2015flood
16.1.16 NZ Listener 16.1.16 (letter): South Dunedin #Jun2015flood
14.1.16 ‘Quaking!’ Dark day$ and tide$ to come #Dunedin #Jun2015flood
10.1.16 Infrastructure ‘open to facile misinterpretation’…. or local ignore
5.1.16 Hammered from all sides #fixit [dunedinflood Jun2015]
● 24.12.15 Site notice: posts removed
3.11.15 South Dunedin Flood | Correspondence & Debriefing Notes released by DCC today #LGOIMA

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

—

Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

Delta #EpicFail Noble Subdivision : A Dog, or a RAVING YAPPER?….

Election Year : The following opinion is offered in the public interest. -Eds

—

Received from Christchurch Driver [CD]
Wed, 2 Mar 2016 at 12:50 p.m.

Your correspondent today was intending to provide his further investigations and suspicions as to what was in fact really happening with the “mortgagee sale” process at Noble, and what they are up to. Pausing here : The term “mortgagee sale” is used in the loosest possible way. Your correspondent has been at work on this, and as the trail to the mortgagee sale has unfolded in recent posts, your correspondent now thinks he has taken What if? readers down a couple of dead ends in an early post or two concerning where Delta may have ranked and what Delta / DCHL are plotting…. He made the mistake of thinking a mortgagee sale was in fact a true arms length mortgagee sale, where security holders went to the market to sell a distressed asset, at whatever price the market saw value at. That is the consequence of seeing through the glass darkly, with a group of men determined to keep secrets, but your correspondent has enlisted some help, and reckons he now has the measure of Delta’s machinations in regard to their ultimate plan.

Readers may be surprised to hear that your correspondent has no personal axe to grind with any of the public figures he has lampooned, merely that on the facts some of them are unfit to occupy the positions they do.

Over a cup of tea, it has been decided to give DCC and Delta a chance to respond to the recent posts by releasing clear information about what has happened and what plan Delta / DCC has to exit the Noble Subdivision. While any Delta / DCC disclosure will be a lot less entertaining than this correspondent (even if I say so myself….) we must sacrifice humour for accuracy at this critical juncture.

It is a critical juncture because this correspondent believes if pressure is not brought to bear on Delta / DCC now, a fait accompli will be soon presented that is going to involve more public funds at risk.

Mr Crombie will assume a sombre tone, and announce that there was no option. He will become TINA Crombie. – There Is No Alternative.

As Justice Brandeis said ‘sunlight is the best disinfectant’ and all of Dunedin deserves precision as to what is going on. Of course, as What if? readers will know, if the Delta / DCC does not respond to the kind and gentle approach (we must give them a chance, readers) there are other avenues presently being explored….

Mayor Cull’s lack of transparency is extremely concerning, and is an indicator to what is happening. If indeed there was a proper mortgagee sale process occurring with negotiations with multiple bidders unrelated to Delta / DCC, there is absolutely no reason why he could not confirm that. This correspondent thinks he cannot because it isn’t true. Blatant falsehoods have a habit of being discovered.

Your correspondent is not a proud or vain man – (well, his wife may not agree) – he and most of Dunedin would be very, very happy if he was proven to be quite wrong, and Delta’s plan did not involve any further public funds. This of course doesn’t make the previous Delta ineptitudes go away. To labour the point : The directors must be held to account.

Today, instead of the headline act, we will tease out some of the implications of the Delta decision to continue work on the Noble Subdivision in December 2009, when the variation to the consented subdivision was revealed to them and they continued on.

This was the critical decision that led to Delta backing up a truckload of dollars off Yaldhurst Rd and tipping it into the freshly excavated ground at the Noble Subdivision. (Your correspondent likes earthmoving metaphors as much as the next man).

Quite apart from the ethical and legal considerations arising from committing a major offence under the Building Code, this correspondent believes this was also a very bad financial and strategic decision.

Delta #EpicFail Noble Subdivision : Gold Band Finance —The Little Finance Company that did (Delta).

Election Year : The following opinion is offered in the public interest. -Eds

—

Received from Christchurch Driver [CD]
Tue, 1 Mar 2016 at 4:17 p.m.

Your correspondent thought it useful to perform some financial excavation and unearth those precious first mortgage numbers that Graham Crombie and Mayor Dave Cull refuse to reveal in respect of the Noble Subdivision. They are the key to what Delta will eventually receive for its official $24M + debt on Noble. Your correspondent worked on the premise that if Delta is trying to hide something, it shouldn’t be too difficult to find at all. Your correspondent was not disappointed.

As they say in Delta out on the site, it was a good day, the ground was soft and the going was good. It didn’t take too long at all to get to the RL of the matter. (RL = Reduced Level…. excavator talk).

But inevitably, as is the fashion of these #EpicFail posts, there is evidence of continuing Delta stupidity, and yet another clumsy attempt to hide the facts from the ratepayers of Dunedin.

Your correspondent has long been curious about the first mortgagee at Noble Subdivision. Who they were, how much they were owed, what was their plan to exit out of this mess. Various entities had been mentioned in the media, but the company is Gold Band Finance. This is a tiny finance company : it has just $15.6M in TTA (Total Tangible Assets), and in August 2013 this one loan – in default – represented 21.30% of their total assets. Only 29% of the company’s lending is in property, and Noble was 70% of this. If Noble turned sour, this company was gone.

As it was, Gold Band breached their trust deed every year from 2009 until 2014 as a result of Noble, and twice had to pull its prospectus and not accept funds because the Trustee was so concerned about its position that it wouldn’t give Gold Band a waiver because the trust deed breaches were so serious.
(Memo To Delta Directors – Find that Trustee and appoint him as an auditor).

Gold Band then in August 2013 decided it needed to get most of this paralysed elephant off its back, so it could continue breathing and operating. Thus it sold part of its first mortgage debt…. to Delta.

Now the usual course of events is that when banks or finance companies are under pressure and want to sell distressed loans, they do so at a discount. That is, just as an example…. The face value is, say, a few million, the borrower is a deadbeat and hasn’t paid anything for years, the loan is in default and the neighbours are suing him for unconsented work (sound familiar ?). The seller would grab 50-60 cents in the face value dollar with both hands and “move on”, to borrow a term from the Cull lexicon.

Typically on land / development projects, a first mortgage will go no more than 40-50% of Loan to Value ratio (LVR) : But Gold Band had assessed the LVR at 71%, so even the first mortgage was far into the red zone. We will return to this in a later post.

From this, what a person of greater than room temperature IQ would say : “Dear Gold Band, I like the cut of your jib, the quality of your borrower and prospects of this mortgage. This (broken) mortgage is a bargain at full value ! Where do I sign ?!

This correspondent can hear the collective ratepayers’ prayer, “Do not say it… no, please do not say Delta paid full value” ….Readers, Delta did not pay full value. It paid more.

Delta #EpicFail Noble Subdivision : NBR interested in bidders

Updated post
Mon, 29 Feb 2016 at 7:28 p.m.

The NBR (National Business Review) on Monday, 22 February 2016, featured an article by Christchurch Bureau reporter Chris Hutching, who says:

“The latest problem [for Delta] involves the Noble Park subdivision (managed by interests associated with Apple Fields) on the western outskirts of Christchurch where some of the properties are the subject of a mortgagee sale. Tenders close on February 12 and parties related to the developers and Delta are understood to be bidders.”

And

“Another hurdle has been a series of actions by a handful of neighbours who have lodged caveats. They were the unsuccessful respondents in last year’s High Court case brought by Gold Band but have subsequently appealed. However, their cause of action may become null and void in the case of a mortgagee sale, according to another court ruling.”

█ To read the full article, go to NBR Print and NBR ONLINE subscriptions: http://www.nbr.co.nz/subscribe

Previously, What if? Dunedin sources had it that Jim Boult and Mike Coburn were back in the picture…. two names mentioned in Auditor-General Lyn Provost’s investigation and report (March 2014) on Delta’s failure with subdivisions at Luggate and Jacks Point.

—

In a more recent article, NBR business journalist Tim Hunter gets stuck into Delta issues – providing a general overview on concerns he has with Delta’s position to date. More is likely to follow.

The National Business Review
February 26, 2016 Page 2 Comment – Hunter’s Corner
Tim Hunter

How council company handed millions to shaky developer
The risks of local authority over-reach are again on display in Dunedin

Excerpt (closing):

The timing, size and nature of the security deals between Delta and Noble imply the council company was advancing millions of dollars in credit to Noble to finance the work.
Delta’s accounts say one counterparty defaulted on two principal sums of $6.35m and $5m, as well as other financial commitments, although it held security in the form of mortgage and general security agreements.
The implication is that Delta is owed the eyewatering sum of $11.3m by one single customer, plus interest and penalties, with the only hope of recovery being from the exercise of its security over property in the subdivision, which may or may not be worth enough to cover it. Tenders closed on a mortgagee sale on February 12.
If so, Hunter’s Corner is amazed that a council-owned company would take on work on such terms and hopes it will in future remember that ratepayers unwillingly carry the can for its cock-ups.
It should also be a reminder that councils would do well to kill off their commercial risks.

█ To read the full article, go to NBR Print and NBR ONLINE subscriptions: http://www.nbr.co.nz/subscribe

—

Related Posts and Comments:
● 28.2.16 Delta #EpicFail Noble… If I were a rich man / Delta Director
● 27.2.16 Delta #EpicFail Noble Subdivision Consent : Strictly Optional
● 27.2.16 Delta #NUCLEAR EpicFail —Noble Subdivision : Incompetent…
● 25.2.16 Delta #EpicFail: Mayor Cull —Forced Sale Fundamentals 101
● 24.2.16 Delta #EpicFail —Noble Subdivision: Cameron, Crombie & McKenzie
● 23.2.16 DCC: DCHL half year result to 31 December 2015
19.2.16 Delta: Update on Yaldhurst subdivision debt recovery
15.2.16 Delta / DCHL not broadcasting position on subdivision mortgagee tender
30.1.16 DCC Rates: LOCAL CONTEXT not Stats —Delta and Hippopotamuses
● 29.1.16 Delta #EpicFail —Yaldhurst Subdivision ● Some forensics
● 21.1.16 Delta #EpicFail —Yaldhurst Subdivision
21.1.16 DCC LTAP 2016/17 budget discussion #ultrahelpfulhints
10.1.16 Infrastructure ‘open to facile misinterpretation’…. or local ignore
15.12.15 Noble property subdivision aka Yaldhurst Village | Mortgagee Tender
21.9.15 DCC: Not shite (?) hitting the fan but DVL
20.7.15 Noble property subdivision —DELTA #LGOIMA
1.4.15 Christchurch subdivisions: Heat gone?
24.3.15 Noble property subdivision —DELTA
23.3.15 Noble property subdivision: “Denials suggest that we have not learned.”
17.3.15 DCC —Delta, Jacks Point Luggate II…. Noble property subdivision

● 14.5.14 (via DCC website) Larsen Report February 2012
A recent governance review of the Dunedin City Council companies was conducted by Warren Larsen.

● 20.3.14 Delta: Report from Office of the Auditor-General
Inquiry into property investments by Delta Utility Services Limited at Luggate and Jacks Point

█ For more, enter the term *delta* in the search box at right.

—

Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

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

Delta #EpicFail Noble Subdivision : If I were a rich man / Delta Director

Election Year : The following opinion is offered in the public interest. -Eds

—

Received from Christchurch Driver [CD]
Sun, 28 Feb 2016 at 9:10 p.m.

Your correspondent has used strong words to criticise the Delta Directors in recent posts in respect of the Noble Subdivision.
“Ineffectual”, “serial head nodders”, “slumbering”.

Doubtless some of the Directors concerned will disagree, violently.

Has this correspondent been too harsh ? After all, it is easy to have 20/20 hindsight.

So today let’s look at the “WWYD” test – What Would YOU Do – in the same situation.

Your correspondent had given this some thought on this sunny Sunday, and while not a captain of industry or commerce as the actual directors, is willing to give it a go.

Yesterday’s post asked if the Directors had any ability to rein in Delta’s management when necessary. This correspondent thinks that is the key issue.

In any company the executive team is tasked with running the company day to day, meeting their various KPI’s and targets, and quite properly that is their focus. No one is perfect and there will be mistakes and duds that could not have been foreseen.

The Directors are there to provide governance and limit the risk to the shareholders. This was doubly important for Delta, as Warren Larsen said DCC companies needed to have a particularly low risk threshold, being publicly funded, and because Delta was operating in the very high risk property development arena.

A further even more basic duty is to ensure that the company operates lawfully at all times.

That is the lens through which I as a Director, would view Delta’s activities.

With that in mind, I thought how I as a prudent Director would respond when at a Board meeting in late 2009, or very early 2010, when it is assumed the Directors learned of the plan change at Noble Yaldhurst just two months after starting work in October 2009.

As a Delta Director I would know that at some point it was likely there were going to be some thorny issues ahead on Noble, particularly given the experiences already encountered at Luggate and Jacks Point.

As a professional Director I would expect the management to have a response to the problem. I would also know that ‘when things go wrong’ is where there is always potential for greater risks to be assumed so Directors would need to be especially vigilant when evaluating management’s plan to fix the problem.

As a Director I would know that management in general don’t like problems – they just want to get rid of it in the fastest way generally and focus on the business and meeting their KPI’S.

They often don’t get a good perspective on the bigger picture. That’s what the Directors are for.

So when it was explained that yes, there was an “issue” with budget costs, but the plan by the Developer was to change the subdivision layout, alarm bells would have rung and the following questions spring to mind (Answers by Delta management).

1. How much of the work has already been done ?
Answer : Not very much just general site excavation.

2. How does this affect the Resource Consent and Engineering Consent ? Answer : Noble (NIL) are or have already applied for a variation.

3. Weren’t there specific provisions for the roading and layout for this zone ?
Answer : Yes there were.

4. What can we do in the meantime while we wait for the varied consent ? Answer : We can do some site clearing but NIL have assured that the consent is a formality and are keen for us to continue.

5. But we cannot do work without a consent surely ?
Answer : Err…NIL have assured us that it won’t be a problem, the CCC are relaxed about us continuing.

6. Is there anything in writing from CCC to say this ? This seems very risky – Councils have to comply with the Building Act, they don’t have a choice, otherwise people would be doing deals with Council inspectors all over the place, and Council would be liable.
Answer : No, we don’t have anything in writing yet.

7. Why don’t we just stop work until it’s sorted ?
Answer: We’ve already set up on site and we want to make the most of the Summer.

8. Directorial discussion ensues : My position would have been : We think the risk is too great. We are already financing the subdivision and not getting paid until sections are sold. We have the upper hand here. Noble will just have to wait. Changing the roads is a major. We don’t need a court case about working on a major subdivision without a consent with the CCC to tarnish the company at this point.

Clearly, a majority of Directors did not agree with the above, and voted to continue.

A key point is that the Directors didn’t only get one chance to exit Noble. From this point Noble would have been on the agenda at every meeting, and they had many opportunities to stop work, when things went from bad to worse. Instead, it appears they took ALL those opportunities to look the other way and, and one result, apart from many millions written off, was to be a party to illegal work.

Delta may say that CCC were relaxed about working without a consent, or some other vagueness, but the Yaldhurst community and the neighbours were far from relaxed. They were never going to stand by and watch a Developer cynically try to ram through a major change on a land zoning that the CCC had just spent years formulating and with public consultation, etc.

So, readers, what would YOU do ?

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New Zealand Companies register: Delta Utility Services Limited (453486)

█ Directors: David John Frow (appointed 25 Oct 2012), Trevor John Kempton (01 Nov 2013), Stuart James McLauchlan (01 Jun 2007), Ian Murray Parton (25 Oct 2012)

More: Historic data for directors

Related Posts and Comments:
● 27.2.16 Delta #EpicFail Noble Subdivision Consent : Strictly Optional
● 27.2.16 Delta #NUCLEAR EpicFail —Noble Subdivision : Incompetent…
● 25.2.16 Delta #EpicFail: Mayor Cull —Forced Sale Fundamentals 101
● 24.2.16 Delta #EpicFail —Noble Subdivision: Cameron, Crombie & McKenzie
● 23.2.16 DCC: DCHL half year result to 31 December 2015
19.2.16 Delta: Update on Yaldhurst subdivision debt recovery
15.2.16 Delta / DCHL not broadcasting position on subdivision mortgagee tender
30.1.16 DCC Rates: LOCAL CONTEXT not Stats —Delta and Hippopotamuses
● 29.1.16 Delta #EpicFail —Yaldhurst Subdivision ● Some forensics
● 21.1.16 Delta #EpicFail —Yaldhurst Subdivision
21.1.16 DCC LTAP 2016/17 budget discussion #ultrahelpfulhints
10.1.16 Infrastructure ‘open to facile misinterpretation’…. or local ignore
15.12.15 Noble property subdivision aka Yaldhurst Village | Mortgagee Tender
21.9.15 DCC: Not shite (?) hitting the fan but DVL
20.7.15 Noble property subdivision —DELTA #LGOIMA
1.4.15 Christchurch subdivisions: Heat gone?
24.3.15 Noble property subdivision —DELTA
23.3.15 Noble property subdivision: “Denials suggest that we have not learned.”
17.3.15 DCC —Delta, Jacks Point Luggate II…. Noble property subdivision

● 14.5.14 (via DCC website) Larsen Report February 2012
A recent governance review of the Dunedin City Council companies was conducted by Warren Larsen.

● 20.3.14 Delta: Report from Office of the Auditor-General
Inquiry into property investments by Delta Utility Services Limited at Luggate and Jacks Point

█ For more, enter the term *delta* in the search box at right.

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Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

Delta #EpicFail Noble Subdivision Consent : Strictly Optional

Election Year : The following opinion is offered in the public interest. -Eds

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Received from Christchurch Driver [CD]
Sat, 27 Feb 2016 at 10:08 p.m. Last updated at 10:32 p.m.

Your correspondent would like to issue a warning to any Dunedin ratepayers venturing into this website : What you are about to read is hazardous to your stress levels. Please fortify yourselves with a nice cup of tea and a big saucer to catch the spills.

We return to the scene of the Christchurch Delta demise today to examine a few “timing and consent” issues.

These may appear to be innocuous words designed not to cause alarm, and indeed, Graham Crombie had assured Dunedin ratepayers more than once that the whole Noble Subdivision problem is merely one of “timing”.

It is now apparent that we cannot take at face value anything that is said by Mr Crombie in regard to Noble, and readers, yet again, not far below the surface, lies another tale of absolute Delta stupidity.

First a few facts to set the scene.

Noble Investments Ltd gained Christchurch City Council consent for 304 lots in May 2009. The subdivision had a small commercial area and a variety of lot sizes.

Crucially, the roads were designed to best practice with a 25m carriage way. The carriageways were separated by a median strip and it had recessed parking bays and cycle lanes. (No cycle lane jokes please!)

Delta started work in late 2009 on the site.

Then in December 2009 NIL (yes readers, NIL by name and NIL by value and many other measures !) applied for a variation to their consent.

This was no minor variation : the commercial area increased by over 200 per cent and the eventual analysis by Abley Transportation Consultants was that the main spine road would have more than double the original vehicle movements.

Readers, please hold your cups tightly :
Delta then ignored the original consented drawings and built the subdivision’s main roads and layout according to a completely NEW plan that had NOT BEEN CONSENTED to by the Christchurch City Council (CCC).

This was not for a day, a week or a month. Delta continued to build the main collector road THAT WAS 4 METRES NARROWER than the consented roadway for at least NINE MONTHS.

Linking back to yesterday’s post your correspondent surmises that the nuclear budget explosion must have happened in late 2009, and the variation being a desperate attempt to cheapen up the subdivision by making the roads narrower and the more commercial area was to pay for the stormwater work that Delta failed to budget for.

Let’s back the truck up here : Can anyone possibly imagine what the DCC would do to a Contractor that continued to work on unconsented work on a massive subdivision for a year in Dunedin ?

The DCC prosecutes landlords for adding an extra room to their student flats, not to mention trying to close down the Saddle Hill quarry which actually has some sort of consent.

In August 2010 neighbours complained to CCC that unauthorised work was occurring on the subdivision and things then got VERY messy. The CCC did issue a retrospective consent, but the Yaldhurst community and many CCC councillors are up in arms about the decision to grant retrospective consent. The Yaldhurst community are seeking a judicial review of the decision. The situation is still not resolved.

Oh, and by the way the December 2009 variation to the consent deleted a road connecting the neighbouring land that NIL had agreed to build, which is another reason why, five years on, the project is still mired in legal action.

Yep, Delta knew how to pick em ! Delta being Delta were too stupid to realise that if NIL were happy to clothesline the neighbour whose co-operation it needed, it would have no compunction doing the same to them.

But readers, that’s not all : there’s is more utter ineptitude :

The CCC got around to warning NIL at some point that any unconsented work was done at the Developer’s risk.

And the Developer, NIL, told CCC that it continued to work because ….., OF THE AVAILABILITY OF THE CONTRACTOR.

There is no way NIL could insist that Delta break the law and continue to work.

In other words, Delta continued to work on the site because it wanted to, because it was easier than finding other work. Another possibility is that Delta felt compelled to continue because it created the whole problem with its monumental stormwater mistake. However two acts of stupidity is still stupidity.

In an act of supreme hubris, it knew the work was unconsented but thumbed its nose at the CCC and did it anyway.

This, from a CCO.

Yes the Developer, NIL are the laughing stock of the industry and have no credibility. But Delta were their enablers. Delta were stupid enough to indulge them when any other contractor would have walked away in disgust.

Words have nearly failed this correspondent. (Apologies again for the caps – stress!)

So, let us return to the directors.

What did they know and when did they know it ?

Did they ever ask management the first and most basic question on a project, “Have you got consent ?”

or, each month, “are there any changes we should know about ?”

or “any changes to our risk profile ?”

Can they read a plan ?

Did they ever visit the site ?

Do they have any aptitude at all to keep tabs and rein in the management of a civil contracting firm?

This correspondent does not believe that the management of Delta, a Council Controlled Organisation, would have kept the Directors in the dark. They are bureaucrats, after all, and would be careful to pass on anything contentious.

On Luggate and Jacks Point, the Auditor-General actually commented that the board had been fully involved and Warren Larsen noted that more transparency and communication was required at the DCC companies.

In the troubled history of the directorial shortcomings of the DCC companies, this is a new low point.

Your correspondent, also, is incredulous that the ODT had never bothered to investigate any of the specific acts of stupidity at Noble.

The information is all public record. We can be grateful to What if? Dunedin that they have provided a forum for this issue.

The Noble Subdivision is an intermodal multiple train wreck.

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Correction received.
Sun, 28 Feb 2016 10:27 pm

At the above post, your correspondent made two errors in regard to the reduced width of the main roads on a number of items :

The reduction in carriage way was from 19.5 m to 11.5 m, a reduction of 8 m, not 4 m….

The roads reduced in width was not the main collector road : It was both the main collector road AND the loop roads…. that is, the majority of the roading.

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Related Posts and Comments:
● 27.2.16 Delta #NUCLEAR EpicFail —Noble Subdivision : Incompetent…
● 25.2.16 Delta #EpicFail: Mayor Cull —Forced Sale Fundamentals 101
● 24.2.16 Delta #EpicFail —Noble Subdivision: Cameron, Crombie & McKenzie
● 23.2.16 DCC: DCHL half year result to 31 December 2015
19.2.16 Delta: Update on Yaldhurst subdivision debt recovery
15.2.16 Delta / DCHL not broadcasting position on subdivision mortgagee tender
30.1.16 DCC Rates: LOCAL CONTEXT not Stats —Delta and Hippopotamuses
● 29.1.16 Delta #EpicFail —Yaldhurst Subdivision ● Some forensics
● 21.1.16 Delta #EpicFail —Yaldhurst Subdivision
21.1.16 DCC LTAP 2016/17 budget discussion #ultrahelpfulhints
10.1.16 Infrastructure ‘open to facile misinterpretation’…. or local ignore
15.12.15 Noble property subdivision aka Yaldhurst Village | Mortgagee Tender
21.9.15 DCC: Not shite (?) hitting the fan but DVL
20.7.15 Noble property subdivision —DELTA #LGOIMA
1.4.15 Christchurch subdivisions: Heat gone?
24.3.15 Noble property subdivision —DELTA
23.3.15 Noble property subdivision: “Denials suggest that we have not learned.”
17.3.15 DCC —Delta, Jacks Point Luggate II…. Noble property subdivision

● 14.5.14 (via DCC website) Larsen Report February 2012
A recent governance review of the Dunedin City Council companies was conducted by Warren Larsen.

● 20.3.14 Delta: Report from Office of the Auditor-General
Inquiry into property investments by Delta Utility Services Limited at Luggate and Jacks Point

█ For more, enter the term *delta* in the search box at right.

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Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

Noble Village Subdivision, Yaldhurst Road – Site Plans Dec 2009
Source: CCC Archives – Proceedings (March 2012)

Delta #NUCLEAR EpicFail —Noble Subdivision : Incompetent Contracting

Election Year : The following opinion is offered in the public interest. -Eds

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Received from Christchurch Driver [CD]
Fri, 26 Feb 2016 at 11:03 p.m. Last updated Sun, 28 Feb 2016 at 2:49 p.m.

Subdivision 101 : Don’t forget the STORMWATER DISCHARGE

Firstly, your correspondent apologises for the teenage habit of using caps in text for emphasis, but recently acquired knowledge some of which is shared below, defied conventional grammar.

An aside: your correspondent was overly fulsome in his praise of Delta CEO Grady Cameron’s transparency this week, when he revealed that Delta spent $3.3M “strengthening their position” vis-à-vis the $20M + debt owed to Delta on the Noble Subdivision at Yaldhurst, Christchurch.

It would have been a lot more credible had Mr Cameron revealed this TWO YEARS AGO, when as outlined in the National Business Review today, the deal was actually agreed.

Your correspondent now knows why the cone of silence has descended upon the Delta Directors, Grady Cameron, GCFO Grant McKenzie and Mayor Cull on this matter.

Mayor Cull has claimed this is just a bad debt. With all respect to the Mayor (that he is due) that statement is simply bovine excrement.

Mayor Cull on Morning Report sounded desperate when he claimed that Noble was not the same as the Jacks Point and Luggate debacles. In this he is correct —it was worse.

It is a tale of a perfect storm of contracting ineptitude as well as directorial torpor.

It is well covered by various posts and indeed the Auditor-General’s report that Delta had severe governance problems, due at least in part to a preponderance of accountants and numbers men. Warren Larsen in his 2012 report, politely said that this led to a culture of “excessive collegiality” (lovely phrase) at the board level. A more accurate description would be the Board acted as a band of serial head nodders.

Your correspondent can report that Delta executive management, and without doubt Dunedin City Council (DCC), knew that the project was in default in 2010 for millions, if not before.

Delta started work on the subdivision in 2009. Your correspondent understands that one arm of Delta / DCC loaned money to the contracting arm so that wages, suppliers and outside contractors could be paid.

This is important because there were it seems some parameters around the loan advances from the finance arm to the contracting arm.

Delta took around two years to complete the development. This is also very instructive because this correspondent’s information is that Delta left site several times because the finance arm would not advance money. Delta’s directors knew they had a dog by the tail in 2010.

So the critical question is – why was the project in default to a degree that caused Delta to leave the site several times between 2009-2011 ?

Readers might think : What was that deadbeat developer up to that caused this default ?

Sadly : the really, really dispiriting fact is that Delta themselves appear to have been the architect of the default that led us to this utter shambles through sheer contracting incompetence.

It seems that Delta provided budgets and estimates to the developers for the subdivision work. In return for one arm of Delta advancing money to pay the other arm, Delta got to do the subdivision work at prices somewhat over market rates.

The Developer relied on the Delta numbers for their budgets to their funders and to set section prices.

The elementary and fatal mistake that Delta look to have made is that they priced the work off incomplete drawings. This was only fatal because they did not know what any other experienced Canterbury civil contractors knew, which is that the STORMWATER DISCHARGE requirements which is controlled by the Canterbury Regional Council, were becoming ever more complex and were a very big cost.

Even if the exact design was not known, a competent contractor would have made some allowance or sought further information, particularly when they were not in a competitive situation. However without knowing the exact details, it looks like the Delta staff had their blinkers on, priced what they saw on the incomplete documents, and catastrophe resulted.

While Delta destructed millions of public funds on Noble, the directors slumbered on. They either had no clue about what questions to ask management to certify if things were under control at Noble, or knew and covered it up.

From what this correspondent can ascertain, Delta started work onsite before the Canterbury Regional Council Consent was issued, which is an issue in itself that bears scrutiny. For a short while earth was being moved, roads built and things were OK.

Then while work onsite is charging on….. BOOM !!!! a NUCLEAR budget explosion emerges when it is discovered that Stormwater discharge requirements will cost $6-7 MILLION, which is MORE than Delta’s ENTIRE contract. The Stormwater discharge had to be installed for all stages which meant there was no quick recovery for Delta at the end of Stage 1.

From there, the financial future of the project and Delta’s payday was doomed. This correspondent understands that the gross realisation of Stage 1 of the subdivision was $6M LESS than the COST of the work. Releasing more stages required more advanced funds from Delta, which appears to have happened, but other legal action then held up any release of sections to market.

By starting the subdivision and agreeing to be at risk (ie forgoing progress payments until sections were sold) Delta were doomed by their own actions. Once they started, they had to keep going until it was finished, otherwise they had no chance of ever seeing any money. Their budget mistakes made sure that the developers who already were spurned by the banks and dealing with 3rd tier lenders had no chance of additional funding.

Delta continued to pour money into the project and watch while problem after problem continued to bedevil the project.

The final indignity and rebuke to Delta is that the mortgagee sale documents apparently treat the land as a bare land development and do not even consider it a subdivision, ie NO value is attached to the $11.3M of Delta work, because the completed work wasn’t built to CCC specifications. Delta must share some blame for this also – it is another example of Delta’s inexperience in the Canterbury market.

This correspondent is determined to bring the directors to account and this will be the subject of future posts.

This correspondent acknowledges that he is seeing through a glass darkly as it were in relation to the precise facts. Some figures and details may not be quite right, but the overall picture portrayed we can be confident of. Mr Cameron is urged to release the full facts about Noble and ignore the ineffectual Mr Crombie before more unpleasant facts about Noble and other Delta matters emerge.

It is clear that the past and present directors (with perhaps one exception) have erected a wall of silence to keep the Public and Councillors in the dark about the massive destruction of public funds they have presided over. They are unfit stewards.

It is now this correspondent’s opinion that the Auditor-General’s investigation of Delta is essential.

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Related Posts and Comments:
● 25.2.16 Delta #EpicFail: Mayor Cull —Forced Sale Fundamentals 101
● 24.2.16 Delta #EpicFail —Noble Subdivision: Cameron, Crombie & McKenzie
● 23.2.16 DCC: DCHL half year result to 31 December 2015
19.2.16 Delta: Update on Yaldhurst subdivision debt recovery
15.2.16 Delta / DCHL not broadcasting position on subdivision mortgagee tender
30.1.16 DCC Rates: LOCAL CONTEXT not Stats —Delta and Hippopotamuses
● 29.1.16 Delta #EpicFail —Yaldhurst Subdivision ● Some forensics
● 21.1.16 Delta #EpicFail —Yaldhurst Subdivision
21.1.16 DCC LTAP 2016/17 budget discussion #ultrahelpfulhints
10.1.16 Infrastructure ‘open to facile misinterpretation’…. or local ignore
15.12.15 Noble property subdivision aka Yaldhurst Village | Mortgagee Tender
21.9.15 DCC: Not shite (?) hitting the fan but DVL
20.7.15 Noble property subdivision —DELTA #LGOIMA
1.4.15 Christchurch subdivisions: Heat gone?
24.3.15 Noble property subdivision —DELTA
23.3.15 Noble property subdivision: “Denials suggest that we have not learned.”
17.3.15 DCC —Delta, Jacks Point Luggate II…. Noble property subdivision

● 14.5.14 (via DCC website) Larsen Report February 2012
A recent governance review of the Dunedin City Council companies was conducted by Warren Larsen.

● 20.3.14 Delta: Report from Office of the Auditor-General
Inquiry into property investments by Delta Utility Services Limited at Luggate and Jacks Point

█ For more, enter the term *delta* in the search box at right.

—

Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

Delta #EpicFail: Mayor Cull —Forced Sale Fundamentals 101

Election Year : The following opinion is offered in the public interest. -Eds

Updated post
Thu, 25 Feb 2015 at 5:22 p.m.

### radionz.co.nz Thu, 25 Feb 2016
Morning Report with Susie Ferguson & Guyon Espiner
Will Dunedin council’s Delta get paid for stalled subdivision? Link
8:44 AM. Critics of a council-owned company owed millions of dollars from a housing subdivision say the public has been kept in the dark.
Reporting by Otago correspondent Ian Telfer
Audio | Download: Ogg MP3 (3′ 48″)

Image: Supplied

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Received from Christchurch Driver [CD]
Thu, 25 Feb 2016 at 9:39 a.m.

Mayor Cull on Morning Report today demonstrated a minimal grasp of commercial reality. He claimed that Delta’s position could not be disclosed because there were “negotiations” with “a third party” (a buyer).

Memo to Mr Cull : A mortgagee sale is the first secured party saying – we have had enough – make us an offer. The amount owed on the other securities is of ZERO interest to the buyer except for the situation outlined below.

What IS of great interest to the buyer, and what Mr Cull DID disclose is that there was only a single party involved. Doh !!!! The “third party” now knows that there there is no competition and the price just went down.

The only time further ranking securities amounts would affect the sale price is when there is a chance that the sale might fetch MORE than the amount of the total debt. Mayor Cull was certainly not saying that, and we can be sure if there was any remote possibility that the Delta core debt of $11.3M with the additional $3.3M being all recovered he would be shouting that from the rooftops.

Mayor Cull confirmed again that there was nothing “dodgy”, or “illegal”, it was just a bad debt and there was no finance element to the deal.

Mayor Cull can then, after the sale process is concluded, reassure ratepayers that he is correct with a full report on the fiasco.

By his own words today he is obligated to do so.

Note : This correspondent was peripherally involved in a forced sale process of a recently completed project of a similar size to Noble (Yaldhurst) Subdivision. It had none of the planning or legal issues that plague Noble’s Yaldhurst. Debt was in excess of $20M and the forced sale process yielded a sale for less than a quarter of that.

[ends]

[villagelife.co.nz]
Image: Supplied

New Zealand Companies register: Delta Utility Services Limited (453486)

█ Directors: David John Frow (appointed 25 Oct 2012), Trevor John Kempton (01 Nov 2013), Stuart James McLauchlan (01 Jun 2007), Ian Murray Parton (25 Oct 2012)

More: Historic data for directors

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Related Posts and Comments:
● 24.2.16 Delta #EpicFail —Noble Subdivision: Cameron, Crombie & McKenzie
● 23.2.16 DCC: DCHL half year result to 31 December 2015
19.2.16 Delta: Update on Yaldhurst subdivision debt recovery
15.2.16 Delta / DCHL not broadcasting position on subdivision mortgagee tender
30.1.16 DCC Rates: LOCAL CONTEXT not Stats —Delta and Hippopotamuses
● 29.1.16 Delta #EpicFail —Yaldhurst Subdivision ● Some forensics
● 21.1.16 Delta #EpicFail —Yaldhurst Subdivision
21.1.16 DCC LTAP 2016/17 budget discussion #ultrahelpfulhints
10.1.16 Infrastructure ‘open to facile misinterpretation’…. or local ignore
15.12.15 Noble property subdivision aka Yaldhurst Village | Mortgagee Tender
21.9.15 DCC: Not shite (?) hitting the fan but DVL
20.7.15 Noble property subdivision —DELTA #LGOIMA
1.4.15 Christchurch subdivisions: Heat gone?
24.3.15 Noble property subdivision —DELTA
23.3.15 Noble property subdivision: “Denials suggest that we have not learned.”
17.3.15 DCC —Delta, Jacks Point Luggate II…. Noble property subdivision

● 20.3.14 Delta: Report from Office of the Auditor-General

█ For more, enter the term *delta* in the search box at right.

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Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

Delta #EpicFail —Noble Subdivision: Cameron, Crombie and McKenzie

Election Year : The following opinion is offered in the public interest. -Eds

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Received from Christchurch Driver [CD]
Tue, 23 Feb 2016 at 10:02 p.m.

This correspondent was very interested to read today’s front page ODT article which appeared to confirm the suspicions of an earlier post.

Delta CEO Grady Cameron must be given credit for being honest and transparent, for confirming that Delta spent $3.3M last year buying more debt on the Noble (Yaldhurst) Subdivision. This is in contrast to the cabbage-like behaviour of DCHL chairman Graham Crombie, and DCC/ DCHL financial controller (GCFO) Grant McKenzie. It has hard to escape the conclusion that Mr McKenzie when questioned by city councillors must have known the amount of money Delta spent “strengthening its position”, ie buying up securities that ranked ahead of the Delta security. First, he said he did not know the figures involved, then he indicated to the ODT after Monday’s council meeting that the figure of $3M “was not accurate”, and that he “could not say” what the figure was. Simply put, if Mr McKenzie could not say what the figure was, how did he know that $3M was not accurate ? It seems clear he did know, and is dancing on the head of a pin. He could say the figure, but he would not. No one is counting the six figure amounts ! Maximum points for dissembling to that man.

This and other verbal pirouetting at a recent Council meeting where Mr McKenzie was unable to distinguish between dividends and debt repayment despite repeated questioning from Cr Lee Vandervis was also alarming. Perhaps the lure of a return to the relatively debt free safe haven of the University beckons, not subject to scrutiny of the citizens….

The other person of interest is DCHL chairman Graham Crombie, who also has trouble with numbers and counting. Cr Hilary Calvert surmised that the $11.7M already written off plus the $13.3M debt meant that Delta had an exposure of up to $24M. Cr Calvert was close, if not quite right as the $13.3M was the value of the debt Delta estimated, not its actual debt. Mr Crombie said the figure “never got that high”, and that the interest and penalties were “horrendous”. Mr Crombie’s nose is growing : Grady Cameron confirmed the core debt was $11.3M, plus $3.3M buying debt, plus the previous year’s debt write down of $10.7M which has already been attributed to Noble by Delta. These add to MORE than the $24M suggested by Cr Calvert, yet Mr Crombie was happy to sidestep Cr Calvert, Cr Vandervis and any other councillors who were keeping up – not many it seems.

We should pause re : Mr Crombie has consistently said since the Noble debacle became public that all would be well, Delta would recover its core debt and the penalties and interest weren’t of any moment – yesterday he described them as both “horrendous” and “irrelevant”. An interesting question is – why were the penalties and interest “horrendous” ? The answer is because Delta’s security was so far down the security chain as to be virtually meaningless, and as a consequence, its charges indeed were horrendous because they had little chance of ever being paid, and the rates reflect that.

This correspondent is alarmed that an accountant would describe the interest payable on a debt as irrelevant, especially when the company in question has in effect financed the entire core debt of $11.3M with either borrowed money from the DCC, or by foregoing dividends to the DCC. Mr McKenzie would certainly not agree that the interest charges are irrelevant because Delta’s loan funding has been arranged through DCC treasury at somewhere between 4-7% per year from 2012. Although, the actual figures might be 3.9% to 6.85%….

We now know, thanks to Grady Cameron, that Delta embarked upon this foolhardy venture with a security ranking somewhere between 4th and 6th in line.

The crucial question is : after this year’s debt purchases, where are they ranked now ? Delta and DCC refuse to confirm this. If they were ranked first, then it would be Delta themselves that had forced the mortgagee sale process. This seems unlikely since if Delta had control as first security, they would have no reason to hide this and the PR department would spin this as Delta taking firm and decisive action to recover their debt. Instead, Mr Cameron meekly says that Delta is a “secured creditor” and the mortgagee sale process is a “significant movement” towards payment. He doesn’t say to who….

It is also a concern why Delta invested a further $3.3M, if they still don’t have control of the project. Others have posited that they almost certainly bought the debt at a reduced value, but the key point is that they don’t have control and first security does not have to have any regard at all to the interests of lower ranked securities. This correspondent has seen at first hand several similar land deals where second ranking securities from large finance companies received zero. One can be sure that the first security will also have heavy penalty rates and other costs will emerge from the woodwork.

Delta were not some minor suppliers on the project. They supplied all of the infrastructure for the subdivision. There aren’t any other big parts to a subdivision. Typically, if the land is correctly zoned, the rule of thumb for the cost of a subdivision is a third land cost, a third infrastructure cost (Delta), and a third profit.

What is truly astounding is that there were at least three securities ahead of Delta and they knew this going into the deal. Any developer that needed three mortgages or debt securities just on the land and the resource consent process before they started work was doomed if there was any trouble, lack of expertise and unforeseen problems. This subdivision had all those, in spades. A further red flag should have been the involvement of one Mr Justin Prain, who previously touted the unique benefits of the similarly doomed 5 Mile town development at Queenstown. In fact the sales pitch was remarkably similar for both developments.

There are many questions to be answered about this debacle, but one that might unlock the whole saga is : what involvement did Murray Valentine, Mike Coburn and Peak Projects have in any entity related to the Noble Subdivision ?

This correspondent urges the other new Delta directors who were appointed after the Noble deal was entered into to show some cojones and order an inquiry. Clearly, it is just too hard for Mr Crombie.

—

This item via whatifdunedin:

### nbr.co.nz Monday May 25, 2015
Apple Fields’ directors fined $30,000 over filing omissions
By Suze Metherell
Justin Prain and Mark Schroeder, directors of the formerly NZX-listed Apple Fields, have been fined $30,000 each for failing to file financial statements for three years.
The Christchurch District Court found the two directors failed under the Financial Reporting Act to report Apple Fields’ accounts, according to Judge Emma Smith’s February judgment. The Financial Markets Authority brought the charges against the two directors after they failed to report the annual accounts for the financial years between 2011 and 2013. The FMA can seek fines of up to $100,000 for failure to report.
Christchurch-based Apple Fields, which listed on the NZX in 1986, was once New Zealand’s largest corporate orchardist and clashed with the Apple & Pear Marketing Board for the right to export fruit independently. The company moved into property development in the early 2000s, with Mr Prain appointed a director in 2002 and Mr Schroeder in 2003.
Apple Fields entered into a property development arrangement with Noble Investments in Christchurch, which was planning to subdivide land on Yaldhurst Rd into 254 residential sections as well as develop a village centre. After changes in the joint venture, Noble Investments could be considered a subsidiary and its accounts needed to be included in Apple Fields’ group accounts, according to the judgment. The Yaldhurst development stalled when Apple Fields ended up in a protracted legal battle with neighbouring landowners.
Read more

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Related Posts and Comments:
23.2.16 DCC: DCHL half year result to 31 December 2015
19.2.16 Delta: Update on Yaldhurst subdivision debt recovery
15.2.16 Delta / DCHL not broadcasting position on subdivision mortgagee tender
30.1.16 DCC Rates: LOCAL CONTEXT not Stats —Delta and Hippopotamuses
● 29.1.16 Delta #EpicFail —Yaldhurst Subdivision ● Some forensics
● 21.1.16 Delta #EpicFail —Yaldhurst Subdivision
21.1.16 DCC LTAP 2016/17 budget discussion #ultrahelpfulhints
10.1.16 Infrastructure ‘open to facile misinterpretation’…. or local ignore
15.12.15 Noble property subdivision aka Yaldhurst Village | Mortgagee Tender
21.9.15 DCC: Not shite (?) hitting the fan but DVL
20.7.15 Noble property subdivision —DELTA #LGOIMA
1.4.15 Christchurch subdivisions: Heat gone?
24.3.15 Noble property subdivision —DELTA
23.3.15 Noble property subdivision: “Denials suggest that we have not learned.”
17.3.15 DCC —Delta, Jacks Point Luggate II…. Noble property subdivision

● 20.3.14 Delta: Report from Office of the Auditor-General

█ For more, enter the term *delta* in the search box at right.

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Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

Hold on! DCC Annual Plan 2016/17 #CommunityEngagement

Tabled at the full Council meeting held on Monday, 22 February 2015

█ Report – Council – 22/02/2016 (PDF, 84.1 KB)
Community Engagement Plan for 2016/17 Annual Plan
Report from Corporate Policy

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Posted by Elizabeth Kerr

*Await release of the DCC meeting video (via 39 Dunedin Television) on YouTube for a full transcription.