More delays for city’s district plan

DUNEDIN’S new district plan is facing more delays.

The Dunedin City Council’s final decision on its second generation plan was set to be released on September 26 but staff have asked for an extension until November 16 to allow time for it to be crossreferenced and checked.

The second generation plan sets the rules for every property owner in Dunedin.

Councillors will vote on whether to allow the extension at a full council meeting on Tuesday.

The Resource Management Act required a decision to be made two years after the proposed plan was publicly notified — the 2GP was notified in September 2015 — but local authorities could extend that period.

Another extension was approved in October last year which allowed more hearings to be held and gave the hearings panel more time to draft any decisions.

Council city development manager Anna Johnson said staff needed the extra time to ensure all changes and decisions made by the hearings panel were reviewed and the plan was prepared for publishing.

A version of the plan which noted all the changes made since it was notified was 2041 pages long and there thousands of amendments, which all needed to be reviewed, Dr Johnson said.

‘‘It just takes a long time to do all the administrative processes which need to be done before it’s released publicly.’’

It was not unusual for district plan reviews to take longer than the statutory period set out in the RMA, she said.

Dr Johnson said she hoped the final plan would be officially notified by November 7, which meant the appeal process would finish by the end of the working year.

Any section of the plan which was not appealed technically became operative and replaced the corresponding rules in the current plan, Dr Johnson said.

There was no deadline for the appeal process, which depended how successful mediation was and when the Environment Court could deal with any major appeals, she said.