'Not the normal way of doing things': Tolley eyes a brave new Tauranga

Wednesday, 23 March 2022

Tauranga City Council commission chair Anne Tolley.

Anne Tolley has little time for social media, and with good reason.

The subject of local democracy has sent Tauranga, New Zealand’s fifth-largest city, into a tailspin of late – particularly online.

Bubbling close to the surface are accusations of the “death” of democracy after Local Government Minister Nanaia Mahuta confirmed earlier this month that Tauranga City Council would be run by a commission until July 2024.

As the current chair of this commission, Tolley has taken her fair share of flak in a city that was due to return to more traditional voting methods and elect a new set of councillors in October 2022.

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Tauranga City Council Commission, from left, Shadrach Rolleston, Bill Wasley, Anne Tolley and Stephen Selwood. Tauranga commissioners.

Instead, following Mahuta’s announcement, Tolley and fellow commissioners Bill Wasley, Stephen Selwood and Shadrach Rolleston now expect to stay in situ for a further two years and four months.

The arrangement prompted a mixed response in the Bay of Plenty, with many breathing a sigh of relief in a city that Tolley suggests is a little “nervous” about the way things have panned out politically. Others have taken a more predictable route, venting their grievances on the internet.

“I don’t follow social media,” says Tolley. “I learnt a long time ago that it’s very easy to make a comment when you don’t have to put your name on it. I always rely on face-to-face interactions, while acknowledging that not everyone tells the truth to your face.”

On a recent trip to her nearest mall, the 69-year-old encountered a few of those interactions from thankful locals. For the next couple of years at least, they have a clear path through an unusual political landscape.

“People stopped me to say how great it is that we’re staying on,” says the former National MP. “It was quite amazing, because I think we’re all a bit uneasy underneath. This is not the normal way of doing things.

“I think people were afraid of change because they felt the city was on an even keel and it was getting back on its feet. The fear was that it would all be thrown up in the air again.

“I’ve been a Minister of Local Government, and the worst job you have is when you have to put a commission in place. But for the moment, this is the best solution.”

Outgoing Tauranga MP Simon Bridges called the decision to extend the commission’s stay as ‘plain wrong’ .

No one on the commission is pretending that this is anything other than unorthodox – least of all Tolley. “I’m not a mayor and I don’t pretend to be a mayor,” she says. “The city, understandably, is a bit nervous about what’s happening.”

While opinion across Tauranga’s communities varies wildly, voices from the city’s sectors are equally erratic. Outgoing National MP Simon Bridges called the decision “plain wrong”, while former mayor Greg Brownless, who held office from 2016 to 2019, rolled out the “death of democracy” line one more time for good measure.

At the other end of the scale, prominent industry leaders called the move “the most popular decision among businesses” and “the best option for Tauranga”.

“You respect them and you respect their views,” says Tolley. “It wouldn’t be right if everyone just agreed that it was a great idea. That’s not the way communities work. In the end, we’re here to do a job and you have to look at yourself in the mirror and ask yourself if you’re doing the job for the right reasons.

“Democracy is more than just voting once every three years. To me it’s about citizens having a role to play in decision making in the places that they live.

“I understand that we’re not accountable in the way that an elected representative is, but I certainly don’t think that marks the ‘death’ of democracy.

“We won’t be here forever, and the city will return to the more traditional voting model, but we have to stand it up on its feet and face it in the right direction before we take a step back.”

Tauranga City Council plan to revamp the city's CBD, with plans including a museum, hotel and new civic whare.

After a busy year since her appointment in February 2021, Tolley is taking a wider view.

The usual themes of infrastructure, roading and the city’s depleted CBD remain high on her list of priorities, but so to do matters around empowering a new generation of voices in what was once considered the retirement capital of New Zealand.

Yet more opposition was thrown in the commission’s direction earlier this year when plans were revealed for a new $300 million civic precinct in the centre of the city. It’s an ambitious project that includes a new museum – an obvious concept in most cities across Aotearoa, but seemingly a huge bone of contention and something of a swear word in Tauranga.

With a rising population of 155,000, can the city afford to linger and stall merely to placate the community’s most vocal elements?

“It comes back to who is talking,” says Tolley, “and I’ve said this at meetings where there’s been a lot of grey-haired people.

“What we’ve had for a long period of time in Tauranga are voices that are very comfortable, saying they like the city just the way it is. They want their rates to stay low, but that means you don’t invest. If you just keep up with inflation, the status quo remains, and that voice has been very loud in this city.

“They don’t want a big city – they’re happy with a 60-80,000 population, whereas the wider community are telling us they want sports facilities, they want community facilities and a theatre that can hold more than 500 people.

“We’re a city of 155,000, and we want all the amenities that go with that. That’s the dichotomy that we’ve got – as the city has grown, more and more young families have moved in.

“Tauranga went through a period of being the retirement mecca of New Zealand, and that voice remains strong because they fill in the forms, they make the submissions and they’re very loud.

“The museum issue is a good example. I grew up in Hawke’s Bay, and I would visit our local museum as a school kid and learn my local history. Our school kids here can’t do that. Where do they learn about their heritage?

“This city has a deep, rich history, and a museum provides an opportunity for kids to learn their history and about their natural environment. At the moment our cultural artefacts are in storage in Mount Maunganui.”

The plans themselves, which if approved would also provide a library, a civic whare (a venue for council and community meetings) and an exhibition space, as well as the development of the city’s waterfront reserve, aim to breathe life into a flagging CBD.

Tauranga’s population has swelled to 155,000.

Many of the city centre’s recognisable retail outlets have fled to out-of-town malls such as Bayfair and Tauranga Crossing, while it’s not unusual for bars and restaurants to start stacking chairs and closing their doors as early as 8pm.

Tolley’s to-do list includes the kind of revamp that would drag most cities out of almost any slump, post-Covid or otherwise.

“It’s one of our biggest challenges,” she says, “because you can’t magic up businesses overnight.

“Several past councils have worked on this, but we’ve refreshed it and the bit I’m proud of – if we get the go-ahead from the community to do it – is the co-design with local iwi and the fact that it’s healing grievances from the past 160 years or so.

“It would bring the city together, but it would also give Tauranga a magnificent point of difference.

“I’m a great traveller, and when you go to countries you always go to the heart of a city because it holds the character and the life of a place. That’s what we want Tauranga city centre to be – a place that connects people. If we can realise that, it would be a great legacy to come out of this unusual governance.”

Already established, but keen to expand, is the Tauranga campus of the University of Waikato – a move that would bring more young people into the CBD and shift the region’s population dynamic even further, says Tolley.

“You have to be careful not to close your bars too early, but you don’t want couches burnt in the middle of town either, so there has to be a balance and we’re doing what we can with developers around accommodation.

Tauranga Racecourse has been earmarked for potential development.

“It might be a bit of a mess over the next few years, but once we have some momentum – and there’s quite a bit of it building – we can enjoy a thriving city centre.”

As if an overhaul of this magnitude wasn’t enough, Tolley’s sights are also set on improving the way council communicates with the electorate and ways to encourage a “wider voice” on matters concerning the city.

She freely admits that council “struggle with that side of things”.

“We spoke to thousands of people last year, and I was disappointed that we couldn’t find a way to capture all of that,” she says.

“Our problem is we have a very structured way of garnering community input. It’s all about making a submission and coming along to talk to us, and that puts a lot of people off.

“For example, we’re working on a local alcohol policy, and I really encouraged some of the city’s bar owners to make a submission. Many of them said they couldn’t be bothered with all the paperwork because they’re busy people, but they are exactly the kind of people who need to front up and talk to us.

“Local authorities and government need to think about different ways of reaching people and make it easier for them to communicate. This is a city of 155,000 people. Just because 300 people make a submission then 30 turn up on the day, how do we know what the vast majority think?”

Despite a rates increase that Tolley describes as “considerable”, she insists the population’s appetite for change is on the increase. Does this suggest Tauranga is finally beginning to embrace its place as the country’s fifth-largest city behind Auckland, Christchurch, Wellington and Hamilton?

“Even though we’ve put rates up considerably, and we’re doing it again this year for the commercial sector, people are saying ‘we know we have to pay, we know we have to invest, we just want to see stuff happening’,” she says.

“They want us to make stuff happen. They know we have to invest, and even some of those grey-haired people want to see the city become great for their grandchildren so that they don’t have to leave the region in the future.

“A lot of people ask ‘what’s in it for me?’, but hopefully we’re moving away from that and we’re responding to those people by saying your children and grandchildren live here – what sort of city do you want for them?”

With the Western Bay of Plenty’s considerable growth showing no sign of slowing, a sharp focus on development – and suitable land in particular – has thrown up more than a few dilemmas.

One such project is the potential development of Tauranga Racecourse Reserve; an 85-hectare site in the suburb of Greerton that has become the subject of a claim lodged via the Treaty of Waitangi Act after plans to build housing were revealed.

Are the commission ready to take iwi concerns on board over such matters?

“We won’t make decisions until iwi tell us what they need that meets mana whenua priorities,” says Tolley. “Their answers to that will inform our decisions.

“We don’t want a war, and they were here long before us, so we want to work in partnership with iwi.

“We might not be able to meet all of their needs, but they understand that and we’re working hard to build a relationship of trust, where they can put what they want on the table and we can work to find a compromise.”