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Design and process for local policy

Presentation

Design & process for local policy

  • Lack of national guidance
  • Complexity and consistency of plans
  • Regional policy statements
  • Lack of plans for critical natural resources
  • Costs and time taken to develop policy statements and plans

Feedback

Industry meeting, Wellington 28 June 2004

  • Absence of sensible national strategies for essential resources, eg. aggregate, coal etc
  • Need for National Performance Standards to support Best Practice: air - water - hazardous substances
  • Model specifications e.g. Hazardous facility screening procedure
  • Strategies immune to short-term government ideologies, eg. high temperature incineration
  • Central government to provide guidance to local government, eg. vetting performance ensuring certainty in interpretation and implementation of national policies and plans
  • Recognise and reward industry initiatives

NGO meeting, Wellington 29 June 2004

  • Councils don't follow their policies in plans
  • Incremental change to plans through resource consent decisions
  • Better enforcement of plans by councils
  • Water plans should be by catchments
  • Landscape plan at regional levels are important to guide districts
  • Appeals on plans should be retained
  • Councils need to explain plans better
  • Enough provision in plan process for feedback and public involvement
  • Keep community involved in plans
  • Council should follow their plans

Industry meeting, Auckland 30 June 2004

  • Guidance via National Environmental Standards, National Policy Statements and Best Practice is needed
  • Current planning approach heavy on process (rules, consents) but light on outcomes. Need to switch.
  • RMA change: require plan change/review to address shortcoming in achieving specific environmental outcomes
  • Tension of efficiency/democracy - centralised plan audit function utilizing Plan Quality criteria achieves consistency, less time is becoming operative
  • Plans should more consistently address when consents be non-notified
  • Compare Building Act: Building Industry Association has been beefed up - where is similar body for RMA
  • Current selective emphasis on some natural resources. Plans often ignore other resources such as the built environment, or minerals. This leads to a "policy vacuum". RMA could lead better.
  • Ministry for the Environment assist in preparing a case study showing how a TA can integrate all the various planning functions that councils have been lumbered with. LTCCP (Long Term Council Community Plan), financial plan, strategic plan, asset management plan, resource management plan

Last updated: 6 May 2008