Wellington super-city scrapped

The super city was the wrong model for Wairarapa.

The Wellington super-city proposal has been officially scrapped.

The Local Government Commission took its proposal to combine Wellington, Hutt Valley, Porirua, Kapiti and Wairarapa into a single entity off the table on Tuesday, citing a lack of public support.

The proposal would have seen the Wellington region’s existing nine councils merged into a single entity with a mayor and 21 councillors overseeing eight local boards of between six and ten members each.

Almost 90 per cent of the nearly 10,000 people who made their feelings known on the super-city were cold on the idea, with opposition strongest in the Hutt Valley.

But the commission did not completely halt the super-city process.

Instead, it invited the Wellington region’s existing nine councils to go back to the drawing board and find another local government structure that would get the public on board.

Local Government Commission chief executive Sandra Preston said there was little support for the region-wide supercity proposed for Wellington but there was a widespread mood for some form of change.

‘‘There needs to be more emphasis on the role of communities, identifying the challenges they face, the options that can address those challenges, and the development of more consensus on their preferred approach to change.’’

Wellington Mayor Celia Wade-Brown said the idea of a super-city from ‘‘Miramar to Masterton’’ was always too ambitious and would have removed too much decision making from the local people. ‘‘We need something much more pragmatic and practical,’’ she said.

‘‘Either improving what we’ve got with the status quo or my preferred position, which is streamlining it down to maybe three councils – the Wairarapa, the Hutt Valley and Capital and Coast. I think that could work quite well.’’

The demise of the Wellington supercity was a win for mayors in the Hutt Valley and Wairarapa who led the opposition charge.

Masterton Mayor Lyn Patterson said she felt delighted and vindicated, while South Wairarapa Mayor Adrienne Staples was similarly ‘‘thrilled’’.

‘‘The super city was the wrong model for Wairarapa and if it takes longer to come up with the right model, I’ll be happy,’’ Staples said.

Carterton Mayor John Booth said the work done to date on a proposal for a single Wairarapa council, which would break away from greater Wellington, was still useful.

Kapiti Mayor Ross Church said scrapping the Wellington super-city was a ‘‘sensible’’ decision.

‘‘There didn’t seem to be a problem that was a fit for the fix they were proposing. We’re pleased they’ve listened.’’

The commission also canned a proposal to merge Northland’s four councils into one, but said it would press ahead with plans to unify Napier, Wairoa, Hastings, and Central Hawke’s Bay into a single Hawke’s Bay council.