Mr Baldock said council staff research had showed little potential economic benefit from the extra day's trading.
"Would council vote to hold a council meeting on Easter Sunday - not likely," he said.
The latest update from the council's snapshot public opinion survey showed that 49 per of the 5154 people who have responded so far supported full and unrestricted opening on Easter Sunday.
With the survey closing this Friday, a further 36 per cent supported shops continuing to remain closed, and 15 per cent wanted trading restricted to specific areas of Tauranga.
Mr Baldock said he could support the Mount Maunganui and Tauranga CBDs being allowed to open because of tourism, the Jazz Festival and cruise ships. This would be the only option that satisfied all the snapshot survey respondents.
The snapshot survey question dealing with pokie machines saw 63 per cent tick the option to reduce the number of pokies over time - a sinking lid policy. Fifteen per cent supported the status quo of the population ratio of one machine for every 220 people, and 22 per cent wanted a cap that kept the number of machines the same regardless of population growth.
The third survey question dealing with election options saw 52 per cent support the status quo of six ward councillors and four at-large councillors. The least favoured option was electing the whole council from wards (17 per cent) followed by all candidates being elected at-large from across the whole city (31 per cent).
The Easter Sunday trading issue was going through a public process that would culminate in a decision by mid-December.
A special workshop of the council's economic development committee last week laid the groundwork for possible change.
"We are keen to get the community's feelings on this issue. It will be hotly debated with strong views on both sides," workshop chairman and deputy mayor Kelvin Clout said.
Public consultation on the draft policy would coincide with the council running a scientific public survey on the options.
Only 214 replies have needed to be removed from the 12 weeks that the snapshot survey had been mailed out with council water bills. They were all from the same internet provider address and had arrived in the space of 20 minutes. No photocopies of survey forms had been detected.
The lack of fluctuations in the weekly survey count also indicated that there had been no mass orchestrated attempt to sway the outcome, councillors were told.