### ODT Online Sat, 15 Nov 2014 Iwi pulls out of project
By Vaughan Elder
Ngai Tahu has withdrawn from a project worth tens of millions to build two student hostels in Dunedin, but says it remains keen on investing elsewhere in the city. Ngai Tahu’s exit from the Otago Polytechnic project does not signal its end, with the polytechnic looking at other options to get it off the ground. The original project had involved building an up to 235-room, $20 million hall of residence on surplus Dunedin City Council land on the edge of Logan Park, with a view to building another hall on adjacent council land if the first proved successful. Read more
Daaave cunningly spots a deepish source of investment potential.
Mark Solomon and his board are no fools.
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### ODT Online Fri, 7 Feb 2014 City-Ngai Tahu good partners
By Hamish McNeilly
The relationship between Ngai Tahu and the Dunedin City Council is “blossoming by the day”, as their respective leaders discuss regional economic development, including the benefits and risks of offshore oil and gas exploration. Read more
Profiles and mugshots of the worthies that you will blame anon.
Fundraising: Are the charitable and pokie trusts mobilised yet, through Sydney Brown’s Old Boy (racing/rugby) connections?! God knows, the Poolers might hire Neville Frost (ex ORFU) now he’s deposed from DVML.
Yep, raising capital according to the Malcolm Farry (CST) principle.
Who We Are | Pooling Together [click image to enlarge, Ctrl +]
The old chestnut Lucas (drear), COC’s wife Christie (hmm), and the rest….
ALL keen to help wet the heads of Professional Rugby and Other High Performance Sportsters, because as yet they can’t quite build the desired new pool at Logan Park (see PR nightmare after the stadium build, given the massive public debt created). Watch this space.
Meanwhile, the Poolers are lined up to encourage urban sprawl at Mosgiel, so the likes of developer Sydney Brown and friends get richer. Every new residential subdivision (on high-class soils) needs a heated pool and spa for speculator ‘life style’ values to be set.
And that folks, is the GAME at DUD. The sideways shift to Mosgiel.
[Note: ODT has stepped up Mosgiel Taieri ‘news’ on Wednesdays to support Real Estate, Property Developers, Local Groups, Businesses, and Clan of the Otago Chamber of Commerce what live on the Taieri.]
Peter McIntyre and John Christie from the Otago Chamber of Commerce had lots to say about the rejuvenation of Dunedin’s heritage fabric and the city’s “vibrancy” after their trip to Portland, Oregon in 2011. What they said then is directly contradicted by the Chamber’s submission on the application for resource consent to redevelop the New Zealand Loan and Mercantile Building (31-33 Thomas Burns Street) for residential use.
Received from Brian Miller
Wed, 23 Jul 2014 at 8:16 p.m.
Message: How’s this. I write about the pool trust declining to comment about my letter today (see Taieri Times) and they won’t publish it. Look at the weak excuse. Just who is the ODT protecting.
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From: Bruce Quirey [mailto:bruce.quirey@odt.co.nz] Sent: Wednesday, July 23, 2014 2:13 PM To: Brian Miller Subject: Re: pool trust
Brian,
I am not going to publish this latest letter in the Taieri Times, because I published a letter from you in today’s issue.
Yours faithfully,
Bruce Quirey
Co-ordinator
Taieri Times
Bruce Quirey
COPY DIRECTOR
Otago Daily Times
——————————————
On 23/07/2014 12:08 PM, Brian Miller wrote:
The Editor Taieri Times.
It is concerning that the Mosgiel Pool Trust is prepared to make public statements concerning the pool, but when questioned publicly to substantiate their claims, decline to comment. The Pool Trust is funded by the ratepayers, there is an expectation that those who pay the piper call the tune.
It would appear that the pool trust is not competent enough to deal with this project, or prepared to gain public support by keeping the public informed.
I now call upon the pool trust to resign, and for [the] Community Board who are our elected representatives to take back the control of the proposed Mosgiel pool facility on behalf of the community, that they are handsomely remunerated to represent on such issues. If the board is not prepared to be counted on this issue. Then they should consider standing down, and being replaced by those with a desire to represent their community, warts and all.
Regards,
Brian Miller.
News this morning (see Jacob’s comments, here and here) that parties pushing the New Mosgiel Pool have selected an ex ORFU Board chairman as the person to head the project. We hear the clandestine selection happened prior to yesterday’s meeting of the Mosgiel-Taieri Community Board. You’re too late, naming rights were sewn up for the poolside spa and bikini bar long long ago.
Mosgiel pool parties with apologies to Bryant Arnold at cartoonaday.com (20.6.10) who sold it at Vegas…
DCC, Slid, if you’re listening —get everything out in the open, don’t dare stymie transparency and accountability through ye olde workshop method where friends of friends clip expensive tickets for each other… while Dunedin ratepayers get ROBBED of natural justice and CLOBBERED for their loot.
And Slid, never assume the bastion of an ex ORFU man has respectibility and honesty written all over it. This does not compute. How much money has ORFU deliberately set about thieving from DCC ratepayers over the years? Yes, that’s right —HUNDREDS AND HUNDREDS OF MILLIONS OF DOLLARS. And “your DCC” is still on the take to “make the stadium work” —while it quietly plays games with the security of our homes on the global derivatives market. Thanks Athol, mate!
(detail) Stooge William F takes a dip in the pool every afternoon
Here’s a cracking distraction: Let’s sell the hippy idea of retirement living, attract new families to fill them privateers’ residential sections sliced out of high class soils. Crikey, Boys! This needs A POOL !!! “Added value, what? Imagine the real estate brochures, the commissions, the new cars…”
“Come to Mollywood! Visit our FLOODPLAIN spa, come leave your worries behind, choose LIFESTYLE ON THE TAIERI (cheaper and cheesier than Wanaka in snow!). New members receive a free 30-minute personal massage and therapy session, guaranteed to smooth away all doubts, dollars and ethics. Don’t forget this week’s special: every booking for an hour-long therapeutic massage earns a complimentary 30-minute facial with council-facilitated deep muddying to embed harsh effects of dirt and crime. Relax folks, we make it OUR BUSINESS to serve the public good. All credit cards (non returnable), outrageous tips and backhanders accepted.”
Lastly, put a robe on, girls —this is a family show.
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Those glorious raunchy paddling pools of lost youth.
The memories of summer fun that get Slid out of bed every morning.
Diary of a Mosgiel mobster. Saturday. It’s blazing hot today and we spend the day going in and out of the water. In the pool, I overhear a conversation that epitomises childhood:
Six-year-old #1: Wanna play Shark?
Six-year-old #2: Ok, how do you play?
Six-year-old #1: I’m the shark and I chase you around.
Six-year-old #2: (ponders for a moment) Ok!
### ODT Online Sun, 26 Jan 2014 Council signal on Mosgiel pool
By Debbie Porteous
The Dunedin City Council has sent a signal to the Mosgiel community. The council has no money for big new projects and while it will help out where it can, the community must drive the project to build a new pool or it will likely not happen, councillors cautioned. Read more
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Since the above article was published the air has been thick with names of local business people who have been meeting behind closed doors, for months now, to push the Mosgiel Pool project —in some cases, for own private gain.
Problems with the Mosgiel-Taieri Community Board continue. Decisions are being driven in non public meetings. The board’s discretionary funds endowed by the city council (through annual rates collection) are being diverted to the local business association to run community board business at armslength from public scrutiny. This is deliberate misuse of city council rates money sanctioned by board chairman Bill Feather and his cronies. When will transparency and accountability be imposed on these elected and non-elected cowboys? We demand that the city council investigates.
Community board member Maurice Prendergast in his letter to the editor today adds fuel to the fire. He is to be commended for speaking out.
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Copy supplied. ODT 4.2.14 Letter to the editor (page 6).
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Letter from Woman Hysteric. Copy supplied.
ODT 10.2.14 Letter to the Editor (page 8).
[click to enlarge]
Note 1: In the 2013 local body elections the Mosgiel-Taieri Community Board had six vacancies, the six candidates were elected unopposed. The same applied for Strath Taieri Community Board (6 vacancies) and Waikouaiti Coast Community Board (6 vacancies). There is no point singling out Maurice Prendergast as if he is the only board member who did not have to contest his seat.
Note 2: It is difficult to reconcile the statement: “Public meetings about a new pool that I have attended, have been “standing room only”.” What meetings were these, when and where did they happen, and where are the minutes from these?
Note 3: “Yes, the board’s chairman has chjampioned the pool for the past six years, as did the board…” Where are the board minutes to confirm the board discussed this agenda item or if it was rasied in General Business?
Think ‘New Mosgiel Pool’, put the cost back on the Community!
But wait… “WE CAN HELP” says ex councillor Syd (aka The Slid).
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### NZ Herald Online 5:30 AM Thursday Jan 30, 2014 PPPs short-term gain but long-term pain
By Tony Holman
OPINION Mayor [Len] Brown has had another vision and is claiming public-private partnerships (PPPs) can relieve the burden on ratepayers. I wonder if he has done his homework. It’s not a vision, it’s a mirage. PPPs are joint ventures between government, or local government, and companies to build major projects such as bridges, tunnels and underground rail – and, in Britain, also hospitals. Too often PPPs overseas end in the failure of the commercial organisation, with the public picking up greatly increased costs to clear up the mess.
PPPs typically involve long-term agreements (25-50 years). They are secret – neither the public nor elected members know the terms. They are weak on accountability with virtually no transparency. They don’t appear on the public body’s “balance sheet” so its financial position looks rosier than it is.
Fixed returns to the commercial business are based on “notional” values and estimates. Real costs are almost always greatly underestimated. PPPs are much more costly than normal public sector construction. Private companies build in higher costs, making the project more expensive and bringing high risk to the venture. But considerable risk is also assigned to the government or local body. Companies can default or go into receivership, creating a debt that has to be paid for by the public and future generations, exactly as if the local body had undertaken the debt directly. Read more
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So. There is former chair of DCC Finance, Strategy and Development, Mr Sydney Brown of the Taieri subdivisions and deals to cousins, and his property speculator/investor friends, thinking to drive the new pool project for Mosgiel. Maybe not quite a PPP but damned near it if DCC gives the nod on squishy terms. Your pockets should feel lighter already.
How much can you trust The Slid —as much as the cost of Fubar Stadium.
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Two comments from Jacob at the draft annual plan thread:
Submitted on 2014/01/27 at 9:00 pm
Mosgiel Pool. The suggestion from council is for the community board to set up a trust with $30k of ratepayers’ money, to do the consultation and get the public to buy in and dig deep and pay for this $12-$18 million project. It doesn’t take long to work out. This is the same setup that led us up the garden path with the stadium. At last count there were four pools in the area to serve the local population. What happens to them. Will they become another liability like Carisbrook? What and who actually is driving the need for a new pool? I recently asked someone who is close to this out in Mosgiel if there has been an analysis done on the need for a new pool, and was told no. But a certain developer in Mosgiel’s main street has plans for himself and his mates to get the public to front up with the money for the building, then they will be able to base some of their business on site at no cost to themselves. Mosgiel is becoming the dog of the city. Big new industrial area was trumpeted a few years ago, to be the answer to the lack of industrial land needed to attract industry to come to Dunedin, sits empty and of no use to anyone. Then we had all the new residential areas opened up in Mosgiel. Most are half empty with spec houses; good rural productive land doing nothing and going nowhere, while the stormwater drains in Mosgiel only work during a drought, and the roads are a mess, no more seal extension. Mosgiel is becoming known as the land of the retirement village and the mobile scooter. Why spend so much on a pool when so many other basic requirements are not being met. Leave it to the community board? Yeah Right.
Submitted on 2014/01/27 at 11:34 pm
Hype. Not being a res of Mosgiel I am not able to answer your question, but I have good contacts out that way who tell me that most of the pools are available, and maybe there are more than the 4 that I mentioned. By the way what is so special about Mosgiel having a new pool, areas like Green Island, Normanby and out on the Peninsula appear not to have one and are just as far from Moana pool as Mosgiel. It appears that the homework for a new pool hasn’t been done out at Mosgiel, but it appears that it was just being used as an attention grabber for the election and that didn’t appear to work either. Like I mentioned before, this has all the hallmarks of another stadium, all bullshit and no substance, just wait to see who gets appointed by the board to do the consultation. The whisper is that it is all cut and dried.
Link received.
Saturday, December 07, 2013 4:29 PM
Anonymous says:
[An acquaintance] has been very involved with uncovering the Kaipara scandal. We’ve decided it is a genetic fiesty gene. You may be interested in putting up the following Youtube link… There are very similar parallels with the DCC!
See what you think.
Published on 22 Nov 2013. Ecocare Bear.
Mangawhai, Kaipara: When Government Goes Bad!!
Mangawhai Ratepayers and Residents Association (MRRA) goes to court in 2014. Please make donations now at http://www.MRRA.org.nz. We need your support to challenge Kaipara Council’s illegal contracts, illegal loans, 100% rates increases and abuse of law. If successful, our court ruling will help all Kiwis stop out-of-control spending by Councils around New Zealand
****
[via Far North email copy to Whatif? Dunedin]
OAG report on Kaipara 3 December 2013
Dear Mayors, Chairs and Chief Executives
This afternoon, The Office of the Auditor General released its report on the Kaipara District Council’s delivery of its wastewater project at Mangawhai and very shortly will be briefing media. The 400 plus page report (and summary report) is a sobering read. Media coverage is likely to be severe and we need to be ready for that. We would ask that you pass this communication on to all members of your council.
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In summary, the Council’s management exhibited a lack of basic financial and project management expertise and little acknowledgement of relevant risks. Kaipara’s councillors also failed to assume governance responsibility for the project, assess its risks and ask the appropriate questions.
It would appear that the only positives [sic] outcomes are that Mangawhai now has a wastewater system that works and has capacity to cater for future growth. Although governance failures are not new in private, public or local government sectors, the report has highlighted significant management and governance failures and successive poor performance with Kaipara District Council’s delivery of its wastewater project.
This performance is not acceptable for local government, whether in the past, present or in the future. As all of us are acutely aware, it reflects very poorly on the sector. However, the issues have occurred – we now need to learn the lessons and take ownership of the broader governance concerns that the OAG has raised.
OAG’s report outlined areas for public sector entities to be aware of based on lessons learnt – these are outlined below. Without doubt there are many strongly governed councils in New Zealand but, as with any organisation, we can always improve. If a focus on governance ensures that a Kaipara is not repeated then the entire sector will gain from that, just as the reputation of the sector is tarnished when things go wrong on such a scale.
As we’ve discussed previously, LGNZ is introducing initiatives to lift the bar. The success of these initiatives will depend on member buy-in. In this regard, the Kaipara episode provides a powerful incentive for the membership to come together to support one another in ensuring that collectively we will strive to ensure that poor performance on this scale is never repeated.
Post-elections training for elected members is now complete. In early 2014, we will launch governance training in conjunction with the Institute of Directors to assess and improve current governance practices in councils. Councils will need to fund this training. In the light of Kaipara, I encourage you to think of such training as an investment in good outcomes and not as an unjustifiable cost.
LGNZ is also soon to introduce its centre for advice and best practice, and has articulated a strong future focus for the sector on financial effectiveness and value. Indeed, a soft launch is already underway with some councils already accessing LGNZ for advice on matters that will form a key focus of the Centre of Excellence.
Governance will be a core focus in the coming triennium. I recommend that you and your council review the report – the 40-page summary may assist here – and consider the relevance of the messages for your council. LGNZ will shortly issue a media release and I will front media as required – we need to acknowledge where there have been failings and show what we are doing to lift performance.
I will continue to write on this subject – including an article which may feature in national media in coming days and in IoD’s [Institute of Directors] Boardroom magazine later this month. It is important that our stakeholders and the public know we are strongly committed to good governance. The video clip on our recent major issues seminar held in Wellington on 21 November – “Why good governance matters in local government” – is available here on our website – this is useful viewing.
I have also provided my speech here. Michael Stiassny, Vice-President of IoD, has made several pertinent points for the sector to consider. We will continue the dialogue, and if you have any feedback for Malcolm [malcolm.alexander @ lgnz.co.nz] or myself [lawrence.yule @ hdc.govt.nz] on this subject, or any other, then please email us.
Kind regards
Lawrence Yule
President
Local Government New Zealand
OAG’s advice to public entities on lesson learnt:
Accountability
● Public entities should be meticulous about legality
● Good record-keeping is the foundation of effective accountability
● Workshops can supplement formal Council meetings, but not replace them
● Contractors need to be tied into public sector accountability mechanisms
Governance
● Understand the role and stick to it
● Common sense is a legitimate governance tool
● Understand what you need assurance on and where you will get it from
● Audit committees can provide useful support
Management
● There are limits to contracting out
● It is important to maintain appropriate financial management capacity and capability and to stick to your sphere of competence
● Project governance and management is important
PPP arrangements
● Do not underestimate what is involved in a PPP arrangement
● Accounting should not drive the decision to enter into a PPP
● Transfer of risk is not an end in itself
● PPPs are unlikely to succeed fully if the contract is not for “the complete package”
Read: DUNEDIN CITY COUNCIL LET’S MOVE TO PROTECT THE CONSTRUCTION INDUSTRY JUST LIKE WE DID PROFESSIONAL RUGBY
(Side bar: Let’s replicate Dunedin’s central police station in Queens Gardens, and other such crocks)
(Question of the Day: Why is a council manager empowered to speak out ahead of councillors and the chief executive? Wethinks Dave Cull has a lot to do with this. Your turn to answer, Mr Cull)
(This is a bit like GM Tony Avery speaking out on council’s need to redesignate for SH88, without telling the whole story of gross council incompetence and the likely multi-million dollar cost to ratepayers)
(It’s what you don’t say)
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### ODT Online Sat, 9 Jun 2012 Council mulls public-private hotel plan
By Chris Morris
The Dunedin City Council is considering a public-private partnership that could result in a second new hotel being built in the central city.
The idea was among several being considered by the council’s city property department to increase the value of the $89 million investment property portfolio it will manage over the next few years. The proposal could result in a 60-room, three or four-star “boutique” hotel being constructed on the council’s Dowling St car park site, south of the Octagon, council city property manager Robert Clark confirmed. If approved, it would be built together with a multistorey parking building, with the estimated $15 million cost split between the council and an interested private developer, Mr Clark said. The council would build the car park and the developer the hotel, meaning the two parties would share costs and returns from the investment, Mr Clark said.
Various council departments were involved in discussing the project, but it was yet to be considered by the council’s property subcommittee – headed by Mayor Dave Cull – and would also need approval at a subsequent full council meeting.
Mr Clark said that could happen later this year, if a detailed analysis established a healthy return on investment was achievable. Read more
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What if? Dunedin... 