Aiming high for a Nelson Xmas

God rest ye merry ratepayers, let nothing you dismay ... your Christmas decorations are planned and on their way.

A giant wilding pine, Nelsonthemed decorations, and a surprise ‘‘multicultural’’ element will all form part of the upcoming Christmas display in Nelson’s CBD.

This year the council’s enlisted former councillor and local artist, Mike Ward, to do the overall design and theme for the decorations and he will be helped by ‘‘half a dozen’’ local artists in their development.

Ward is staying quiet about the specifics, but said it would reflect the spirit both of the community and Christmas.

He’s based them on a citation which has inspired the Christmas display.

‘‘And since it was Christmas and the season of goodwill what better time to celebrate the abundance of love, kindness, generosity, wisdom and warmth that made their splendid wee city such a lovely place to be,’’ the citation reads.

Ward said Nelson’s ‘‘friendliness’’ would be reflected in the designs, which featured ’’hearts and flowers’’ alongside other elements that represented the local landscape.

Nelson Mayor Rachel Reese joked about getting a bit of flak last year, for her apparent forgetfulness regarding Christmas decorations.

Last year Trafalgar St had just a few banners and a small Christmas tree on the Church Steps, prompting locals to question if the council had forgotten Christmas.

Nelson Mayor Rachel Reese said at the time there had been no fewer decorations than previous years, but told a local radio station she had forgotten to organise a new Christmas tree and decorations.

This year she said there would be no ‘‘scaling back’’ and said even getting the giant wilding pine to the Church Steps would be a ‘‘test’’.

She said pine would provide locals with a similar experience to their own homes.

As wilding pines are considered a pest, she said there was a symbolic element to removing from the environment.

Reese said she wanted Nelson to have an ‘‘authentic’’ Christmas, and had been keen on sourcing the decorations from local artists, rather than importing them.

The decorations will go up at the end of November. The winner of the council’s Christmas tree competition will have their design assembled in the Cathedral, alongside other Christmas displays. The decorations for the main will be designed by Mike Ward.

The under-delivery of the council’s works programme led to the lower debt than what was budgeted.

The strain on labour and resources has caused delays for civil contracts for both Nelson City Council and Tasman District Council, and led to them tendering contracts that have flexibility as to when work is completed.

Councillor Tim Skinner asked whether the debt level would ‘‘realign’’ itself when the works programme was undertaken. In response, council staff said this year’s programme was quite large and if it was all delivered, debt would likely ‘‘catch back up’’ to the predicted level.

However, they said the surplus was not impacted by a non-delivery of capital programmes, but because of revenue from grants and subsidies, development contributions, and income from building and resource consents.

The council spent $1.1m less than it budgeted for on personnel.

Chief executive David Hammond said they were having difficulty filling vacancies due to skill shortages. ‘‘Particularly areas like resource consenting, which is sticking out like a sore thumb at the moment.’’

The council paid more than $70,000 to former chief executive Clare Hadley in a severance package. The council also made a redundancy payment of more than $90,000 to a former staff member.

Cr Matt Lawrey questioned the narrative around water quality and the environment. He said it was highlighted as an achievement, but in another section it said a third of the measures of success had not been met.

Staff said it was down to targets set and different measures used, particularly in regards to recreational water sites where any bacteria exceedance took them out of the achievement bracket. All recreation spots, except Cable Bay, had at least one ‘‘red alert’’ bacteria exceedance, which staff attributed to stormwater runoff following rainfall events.

Mayor Rachel Reese said the council had ‘‘started a journey, but we are not there yet’’.