Brooklyn moving south in ward shift

It won’t take any longer to get to the CBD but the Wellington suburb of Brooklyn is about to feel less central.

Wellington City Council is mulling moving the ward zone, and even a city councillor will be shunted out if the boundary lines are modified.

The council is legally obliged to review its arrangements for elections every six years and its review of representation for the 2019 and 2022 elections proposes to change ward boundaries to better reflect communities.

Brooklyn, which has been divided between the Lambton and Southern wards looks set to be amalgamated and become part of the Southern ward.

It is also being proposed that Southgate will join the Eastern ward and for all wards to have bilingual names.

The proposed new boundaries would shift Lambton ward councillor and Brooklyn resident, Brian Dawson, into the Southern ward.

‘‘My neighbours and I consider that we live in Aro Valley and not Brooklyn.’’

Dawson, who rents his home, said if he stayed and was re-elected, he would live three doors down from where his ward started. He had received mixed

feedback from residents and many them did not care.

‘‘Some of them don’t even know what ward they are in anyway. One of the sad things for me during this process is the comment of ‘who cares?’ ’’

Dawson urged the council to think seriously about changing the suburb boundaries, which were not ‘‘natural lines’’ and were used for the proposal.

Deputy mayor Jill Day told councillors at a meeting on Wednesday that the council’s current arrangements did not meet the criteria for a fair representation. ‘‘Each councillor must represent the same number of people but at the moment the Eastern and Lambton Wards do not meet that.’’

Research showed people would also be interested in giving te reo names to the wards, she said.

‘‘It’s beautiful, it’s official and it’s ours … We want Wellington to take hold of these names. I think Wellington is ready of to recognise its te reo history.’’

Lambton ward councillor Iona Pannett said some concerns had been raised by the Brooklyn community and she acknowledged Brooklyn residents who felt more closely aligned with the central city.

It was difficult but the Lambton area was getting bigger, and during the past 10 years suburbs were being pushed out.

Onslow-Western ward councillor Andy Foster said every person’s vote was intended to be counted the same but one of the challenges with the proposal was that it was slightly outside that.

It meant the Eastern ward vote effectively counted as 20 per cent more than the Southern ward, which was not ideal, he said

Carl Savage, of the Brooklyn Residents’ Association, said they had only recently found out and it came as a surprise.

Rongotai MP Paul Eagle, a former Southern councillor, was concerned about the proposal. It just exceeded the recommendation for representation and his biggest objection was the Southern ward would still only have two councillors, while the others had three.

Public consultation will run from April 4 to May 4 and councillors will vote on the final proposal on May 30.