$7.5m emergency response centre to be built
A new $7.5 million one-stop-shop multi-agency civil defence emergency co-ordination centre for Northland is expected to open in Whangārei by the end of 2026.
Emergency Management and Recovery Minister Mark Mitchell visited the site of the new centre and announced that the government would provide $1.037 million of top-up funding towards it.
Ratepayers across Northland’s four councils have already contributed $6.533m during the past two years.
The single-storey multi-agency co-ordination centre will be built on 3000m² of Fire and Emergency New Zealand (FENZ) Mansfield Terrace land in Whangārei’s city-edge Regent suburb.
Construction is expected to start during the next year.
The 809m² centre will be Northland’s first standalone regional-level emergency co-ordination centre building.
It will also be the northernmost facility of its type in New Zealand.
Mitchell said New Zealand was at high risk for events such as earthquakes and tsunami. It could better respond to these by having a network of co-ordination centres across the country.
“Communication and connecting is extremely important. This centre will go a long way to ensuring there’s better communication and connectedness, with all first responders in one location,” Mitchell said.
“When constructed, the multi-agency co-ordination centre will bring together response agencies under one roof, allowing for faster information sharing, more efficient resource allocation and improved co-ordination and collaboration before, during and after emergencies. Ultimately, this is about ensuring local and regional emergency responses can be initiated swiftly and effectively, helping to keep people safe,” Mitchell said.
Building design work will be among next preparation stages.
The centre’s impetus comes from Northland’s March 2021 tsunami threat, after an earthquake in the Kermadecs to the north of New Zealand – and what became the region’s biggest tsunami evacuation with tens of thousands of people moving to higher ground.
The North’s current emergency co-ordination centre venue is based in Northland Regional Council’s main Whangārei Water St head office building, which is roughly at sea level and on the edge of a tsunami evacuation zone – as well as in a 1-in-100year flood hazard zone.
Northland Civil Defence evacuated this Northland council-based response site as a result of the March 2021 tsunami threat, shifting to the Regent FENZ offices, on higher ground.
The new building’s site is about 30m above sea level and above the tsunami and flood hazard zones potentially affecting the council in Water St.
FENZ Northland district manager Wipari Henwood said the 2021 tsunami response saw Civil Defence and emergency responders crammed into FENZ’s Mansfield Terrace offices: “We had everybody here. Even though we were crammed, you could look across the room and make things happen.“
Northland Civil Defence emergency manager Graeme MacDonald said Northland Regional Council would be borrowing to build the centre, with rates used to repay that borrowing over 17 years, until 2038/2039.
“Northland has had a number of large region-wide emergencies, but we do not have a dedicated multi-agency co-ordination centre that enables a truly integrated across-agency response,” MacDonald said.
FENZ’s Henwood said the new centre would house about 40 staff civil defence and FENZ staff during business-as-usual times. That would increase to about 60 people when an emergency was declared.
This is Public Interest Journalism funded through NZ On Air.