Submission on Wellington City Council Mahere Ā-Tau Annual Plan 2020/21

Executive Summary

As Wellington enters the 2020s, it is worth reflecting how far the city has come. Over the last 40 years, the city has transformed from a grey centre of bureaucracy to the thriving cultural and commercial hotspot it is today. Much of this progress has been shaped by successive councils who had a vision for how the city can redefine itself and had the leadership to make it happen.

Today, the city is facing challenges as daunting as any from the 1980s. The success of the last 40 years has grown the city’s population and economy, putting critical infrastructure under strain. Our transport networks have barely changed since the Thorndon Motorway was built in the 1970s. Housing construction has not matched population growth meaning affording a house is now out of reach for many. And the passage of time has further decayed our water pipes which are regularly failing.

On top of this growth, contemporary events have conspired against the city. In 2016, the Kaikoura Earthquake caused considerable damage to the CBD. Significantly, the city's heart around Civic Square closed, turning an already struggling area into a 'dead zone'. The earthquake also caused commercial property insurers to rethink their risk exposure and push up premiums.

While all the challenges outlined above have evolved over time, we now find ourselves in the middle of a 1-in100-year pandemic, leading to perhaps the most severe economic recession of the post-war period. Covid-19 has brought urgency to the need for Wellington to tackle these problems. Our challenges amount to more than we can afford under a business-as-usual approach, which would lead to rapidly rising rates at the very time families and businesses can’t afford them. This urgency means not waiting until the next iteration of the 10- year plan to act. While it is probably not feasible to bring the 2021-31 Long-term Plan forward, we do urge councillors to start tackling the larger problems and, as a minimum, avoid taking decisions which close off longer-term solutions.

So now Wellington city is facing specific, large-scale problems which require councillors to think differently about how to solve them. This is all within the context of climate change and the need to reduce emissions over coming decades. The Council needs a strategic vision for what it wants Wellington to be to meet the needs of residents and businesses. We cannot retreat into just being a 'public sector' city. The city's vibrancy is a crucial reason why people and companies choose to be here.

In short, this annual plan requires the Council to lift its head and think hard about where Wellington needs to go over the next 40 years.

Wellington needs to address six key challenges:

1. Supporting economic recovery by ensuring Council expenditure goes towards projects and infrastructure, which brings long-term productivity benefits.
2. Empowering Wellington Water to better manage its assets and fund future investments by raising its own revenue streams.
3. Use the current opportunity through central government stimulus to renegotiate the flawed ‘Let’s Get Wellington Moving’ deal so transport costs are fairly split between central and local government.
4. Champion housing developments which supports the construction sector while giving residents modern, affordable homes.
5. Rethink how Civic Square can be revitalised in partnership with commercial developments, this should evolve into considering the future of the whole ‘ground floor’ of the city.
6. Collaborate with ratepayers to increase the city’s environmental resilience, this includes strengthening earthquake-prone building, addressing runaway insurance premiums, preparing for sea level rise, and working to reduce emissions...

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