Flood protection work set to begin

More than 100 jobs are expected to be created when work on some of Southland’s stop banks starts in the New year.

Environment Southland voted to proceed with the ‘‘shovel ready’’ flood protection work at an extraordinary meeting of the council yesterday.

It had secured ‘‘shovel ready’’ funding from the Government to upgrade the flood protection schemes in Invercargill and Mataura, and to repair flood damage in the Waiau catchment.

The total cost of the projects is $18.5 million.

Council catchment operations manager Paddy Haines told the council meeting that the physical work would use different contractors, and all the work would be tendered to give companies an equal opportunity to be involved.

The projects were expected to create more than 100 jobs in Southland.

Some of the work being undertaken this financial year included rock work on the Mataura stop banks, upgrading and extending the stop bank at Boundary Creek upstream of the Mataura township, and the purchase of the new pump for the Lake Hawkins pump station on Stead Street, near the Invercargill Airport.

Work would begin in the Mataura area and on the Waiau River first, he said.

Cr Jeremy McPhail congratulated the council staff members involved in securing the funding allocation from the Government. ‘‘It’s been a great coup, especially for Mataura where they had a close call in February,’’ McPhail said.

Deputy chairman Lloyd McCallum said the funding was a great opportunity for Southland.

‘‘It’s been more than 30 years since central government put funding of this scale into Southland’s flood defences and it means we can improve the resilience of our communities years sooner than we would have been able to without it.’’

The regional council had consulted with the community about the project, to be co-funded by the Government and Environment Southland, because the grant for the work came from an unexpected Covid-19 stimulus package, they were not planned, nor budgeted for in council’s 2020/21 Annual Plan.

Thirteen submissions were received from 11 individuals/organisations. Ten submitters were in support of the opportunity, and one submitter was opposed because they disagreed with the areas selected for upgrades.

Gore District Council raised a number of issues in its submission, including the financial implications for Gore ratepayers, but Environment Southland’s view was that the points made were not significant enough to trigger ‘‘opting out’’ of the programme of work.