Single men too risky for Brydan
A Blenheim motel pegged for emergency housing could provide safe, dry housing for up to 50 people, but single men need not apply.
Neighbours of Brydan Accommodation, in Springlands, have heard arguments for and against a resource consent application to change the motel into transitional housing at a hearing on Tuesday.
The Ministry of Social Development has revealed the specifics of its plan for the motel, tweaked slightly from its initial proposal to alleviate concerns about safety, noise and traffic.
Ministry representative Sarah Sinclair told a crowd of about 25 people at the Marlborough District Council that applicants would be assessed for risk factors when they asked the ministry for emergency housing.
Single men would not be allowed to stay at the proposed housing complex, Sinclair said.
The emergency housing would be run by the Crossroads Charitable Trust, in Blenheim, in partnership with the Christchurch Methodist Mission.
Crossroads Charitable Trust coordinator Janette Walker said there were other places for single men to stay in Blenheim.
‘‘We would use another motel. One motel owner ... has put in some caravans. If I think a person is a risk or not safe, I would put them in there,’’ Walker said.
Solicitor Nigel McFadden, representing five opposing parties, said the ministry’s assessment of applicants was cold comfort, as neighbours would not get to help choose the criteria, and there was no condition in their consent application that outright banned people they deemed as a risk, such as single men.
‘‘It’s really difficult for my clients, or the neighbours, to oppose something that benefits the community and say their concerns through me.
‘‘But they’ve had to, because what [the ministry] has proposed is not what they’ve applied for.’’
The Wairau Awatere Resource Management Plan said the motel was in an urban residential zone. McFadden said the ministry’s application for a residential activity should have been for a community housing activity instead, which would be noncompliant with the zoning.
The Wairau Awatere plan defined community housing as a place that provided residential support for people with physical, intellectual or psychiatric disabilities, emergency accommodation, women’s refuges, children who could not live at home and people with addictive behaviours.
Independent commissioner Richard Fowler QC said perhaps there was some overlap in the categories and the ministry’s proposal could technically come under both residential and community purposes.
Council resource management officer Jenny Folster said it was ‘‘a little bit bizarre’’ that the community housing definition could cover residential activities, but she believed the ministry’s proposal was a residential proposal. ‘‘The effects are virtually nil. There’s no visual effects, there’s no traffic effects, there’s no noise effects.’’
McFadden said the ministry’s plan to use the conference centre as a room for budgeting courses, CV writing and other essential skills should have had a separate consent application as a community facility.
McFadden submitted that courses such as music lessons could be ‘‘annoying’’ to the neighbours even if they did not exceed the noise limits.
The New Zealand Transport Agency had written a letter advising it was satisfied safety concerns were mitigated in the plan.
However it did not address the possibility of a second entrance being created off State Highway 6, which McFadden said would be unsafe. Fowler said his main areas of interest were the definition of community housing and potential category overlap, the impact of the training room, and the ministry’s tweaks to their original plan, including a perimeter fence, and not allowing former tenants back to complete courses.
The hearing was adjourned for 25 working days.