Mayor’s US trip costs over $16k

A trip to North America by Christchurch’s mayor and her top aide cost ratepayers nearly $16,500.

Mayor Lianne Dalziel has approval to visit six countries between financial years 2016-17 and 2019-20, costing about $22,000.

City councillors unanimously approved the destinations in May last year, although Dalziel is unlikely to travel to Singapore, as indicated at the time.

Last year’s North America trip, which included a visit to Christchurch’s sister city Seattle, cost $7630 for Dalziel, $7538 for her chief of staff, Ariana Smith, and included $1277 in expenses and gifts. The total cost was $16,445.

A council spokeswoman said Dalziel’s $7630 bill was $630 over the indicative budget for the trip, which she reimbursed.

The mayor had already reimbursed the council for a $393 flight between San Francisco and Montreal.

‘‘Reflecting on this matter, the mayor felt that councillors might consider the $7000 as the budget, and has therefore reimbursed the sum of $630 in addition to the other amount reimbursed,’’ the spokeswoman said.

The spokeswoman said staff travel came under the civic and international relations budget, which was separate to the budget for the mayor and councillors’ overseas travel.

Dalziel travelled to Seattle as part of her North America trip to attend the annual Seattle-Christchurch board dinner and to commemorate the 36th anniversary of the sister city relationship with that city. The mayor attended activities including addressing a public event on the Canterbury earthquake experience and unreinforced masonry buildings.

She said sister city relationships were ‘‘an important part of Christchurch’s identity’’.

Dalziel’s role as the city’s representative secured ‘‘access at a senior level, for Christchurch business, education and community groups, and a strong commitment to dialogue and media coverage’’.

‘‘The mayor also visited Tacoma as part of the Seattle sister city relationship,’’ the spokeswoman said.

‘‘In addition, the mayor took the opportunity to accept a speaking engagement in Portland on the subject of the earthquake and unreinforced masonry buildings.

‘‘She also stopped over in San Francisco to meet with the San Francisco Airport, and used the opportunity to meet with officials from Sonoma County affected by the fires in the region.

‘‘The stopover in San Francisco enabled the mayor to travel to Montreal for the ITS World Forum, where she had a speaking role.’’

Dalziel travelled to Adelaide last year for the 45th anniversary of the Christchurch-Adelaide sister city relationship.

In June 2017, she travelled to South Korea to attend the New Cities Summit as a guest presenter on social infrastructure, natural disaster resilience, and flexible and resilient city services.

‘‘This trip provided an opportunity for the mayor to visit our Korean sister city, Songpa-Gu, meet members of the Kiwi Chamber of Commerce Korea, visit the headquarters of the Korean Polar Research Institute (KOPRI), and to sign a MOU with Busan Metropolitan City with respect to Antarctic co-operation,’’ the spokeswoman said.

Dalziel had planned to visit South Korea, the United States, Australia, Japan, Singapore and China during her term.

The spokeswoman said Dalziel indicated she was unlikely to travel to Singapore this year and, if she did, she would not use the approved $6000 budget to meet her costs.