Spotlight on the environment

Environmental work in wider Manawatu¯ is set to become more targeted on problem areas, with a new plan and council officers working closer together to put money where it is most needed.

Horizons Regional councillors received a preview of their council’s planned work for the year at a strategy and policy committee meeting this week.

Natural resources and partnerships manager Jon Roygard said the work set out in the natural resources and partnerships plan, which merged six other plans and 400 pages into one 70-page document, takes up 40 per cent of the council’s rate take – a total of $24.5 million. There was also significant funding from government agencies, totalling $30m since 2012.

The plan has five key points for the next year: better communication, meeting improvement targets, improving information management, responding to policy changes, and more working together within the council and with outside parties to meet goals.

Working together was a massive focus, with different parts of the council to meet more often to make sure work was done in the best places, Roygard said. That could involve the monitoring team finding out where waterways were not as healthy, then working with landowners to get more fencing done, he said.

Those places were made more obvious when science and innovation manager Abby Matthews gave detailed information about the health of various parts of the region Horizons covers. The Horowhenua catchment had the most swimmable waterways, at 73 per cent, beating the goal of being 70 per cent swimmable by 2030. However, both lakes surveyed were either non-vegtated or in poor health.

Councillor David Cotton and chairman Bruce Gordon pointed out that waterways in the Whanganui catchment could only hit 51 per cent as swimmable, yet most were surrounded by native bush.

Gordon noted how the Whanganui River was pristine until it hit the O¯ hura River.

‘‘You can see a marked difference.’’