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Making a Submission on a Proposed Plan or Plan Change

Council plan preparation and plan change process

Introduction

Setting the scene: district and regional plans

What you need to know before you make a submission

How to make a written submission

Tips for writing a good submission

How you can make a 'further submission'

What happens next?

What you need to know before you make a submission

Before you decide to make a submission, you need to understand what the proposed plan, plan change or variation involves, and how it might affect you.

The first step is to study the documents provided by the council. Plans can seem complex, especially if you are unfamiliar with their structure and jargon. You might want to ask council staff to help you understand what is being proposed or seek independent professional advice. When considering making a submission on a proposed plan, plan change or variation you should:

• discuss the plan, plan change or variation with council officers. They'll help you identify what sections of the plan you need to look at
• make sure you understand what plan provisions are being changed or replaced and why (if it is a plan change or variation). There will often be supporting information that explains what is being changed and why
• identify whether the change or variation affects property you own or occupy, or whether it affects the wider environment of the community you live in.

Property concerns

District plans usually divide areas into defined management areas or 'zones'. Your property will be in at least one of these defined areas. It might even be in several overlapping areas. Each area has provisions about how the council will manage the environment.

Provisions are the council's objectives, policies and rules. Objectives and policies state the council's goals in dealing with an environmental issue. Rules state how the council will achieve those goals and sometimes additional methods will also be stated.

Check the planning maps attached to a district plan, plan change or variation to find out:

• whether the rules and provisions that apply to the area your property is in will change
• whether any special restrictions will be placed on your property. For example, the planning maps might show that a tree with historical significance is on your property, which could affect building or landscaping plans you have.

Regional plan rules may also refer to defined areas for management, but it is more common for particular activities to be controlled, for example the burning of material or the taking of water.

Check a regional plan, plan change or variation to find out whether new rules might affect an operation you run or an operation you are planning. For example, the plan, plan change, or variation might include new rules about the discharge of odour from an indoor farming operation. This might affect you if you're running a piggery.

Wider environmental concerns

A plan, plan change or variation might also affect a wider part of your local community, district or region.

You might feel that an area on the outskirts of your town is losing its rural character because of urban development. Does the change or variation to the district plan encourage more development in this area?

You might be concerned at the potential impact of marine farming in your local harbour. Does the proposed regional coastal plan, or change or variation to that plan, allow more marine farms? Or does it restrict their establishment to certain parts of the harbour?

Conversely, a proposed plan, plan change or variation might have positive community benefits like improving the water quality of your local river, or promoting the redevelopment of an urban area that is currently run down. When you're reviewing a proposed plan, plan change or variation to a plan you should:

• identify the wider environmental issues you are concerned about that might be affected either positively or negatively by a proposed plan, plan change or variation
• check the zoning and rules in the proposed plan, plan change or variation and identify what effect they will have
• check whether the proposed plan, plan change or variation has any new objectives and policies that concern you. For example, a change or variation in a regional coastal plan might restrict access along certain parts of the coast
• check whether the proposed plan, plan change or variation, has new objectives or policies that you agree with. It might, for example, allow you to subdivide your section when you previously couldn't. Or it might provide protection to an area of native forest you've always liked. If so, you might like to make a submission supporting these moves.